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ISRAEL PUTNAM 




War News from Lexington 



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ISRAEL PUTNAM 

C'OLD PUT") 



A STORY FOR 
YOUNG PEOPLE 



BY 

LOUISE SEYMOUR (HASBROUCKli "^f^^nyrrt^ 

AUTHOB OF "la SALLE" ^ 



Putnam scored with ancient scars 
The living records of his country's wars. 
"Columbiad,'' Joel Barlow, 1787. 




ILLUSTRATED 



D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 

NEW YORK LONDON 

1916 






COPTEIGHT, 1916, BT 

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 



OCT -2-1316 

Printed in the United States of America 



'CI A 4 380 04 



TO 

MY FATHER 



FOREWORD 

For the material used in the following book I am 
chiefly indebted to William Farrand Livingston's "Israel 
Putnam," to William Cutter's "Life of Putnam," and to 
various histories of the period. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. A Jolly Boyhood 3 

II. A Wolf-Hunt and Other Matters . 15 

III. Battle of Lake George . . . .29 

IV. Ranging 43 

V. The Disappearing Sentinel and Other 

Adventures 53 

VI. Harassing Montcalm . . . .63 

VII. The Tragedy of Fort William Henry . y2) 

VIII. Ticonderoga 83 

IX. Captivity 99 

X. Canada Conquered 119 

XL The Siege of Havana .... 133 

XII. Pontiac's Rebellion 147 

XIII. A Hero at Home 161 

XIV. "The Company of Military Adventurers" 17?. 
XV. On to Boston . . . . » . .189 

XVI. Bunker Hill . . . . . .20.1 

XVII. At New York 22J 

XVIII. In Trouble and Out Again . . ■ . 243 

XIX. A Sunny Old Age ... . . .255 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



War News from Lexington 

Early Adventure of General Putnam . 
Birthplace of General Israel Putnam 
Israel Putnam (after Wilkinson) 
The Battle of Bunker Hill . 
Israel Putnam (after Trumbull) 
Putnam's Escape at Horse Neck 
Putnam's Duel with the British Officer 



Frontispiece 

FACING PAGE 

o 4 
. i6 
. 204 
. 216 ^' 
. 224 .'' 
. 250 
• 256 



I 

A JOLLY BOYHOOD 



I 

A JOLLY BOYHOOD 

IN the days when forests covered most of New 
England — when the Indian war-whoop still 
echoed on its borders — when children ate corn- 
meal porridge from pewter porringers, and grown 
people stirred their hot drinks with a poker heated 
in the fireplace — in those good old days, two cen- 
turies ago, there lived in the neighborhood of Old 
Salem, Massachusetts, a jolly, sturdy, red-cheeked 
boy by the name of Israel Putnam. 

In all the things that require strength, courage, 
energy and quickness of decision, Israel excelled his 
playmates. He was the leader in old-fashioned 
games and sports, such as running, wrestling, throw- 
ing the bar, and football. When he grew up, his 
dashing exploits during the French and Indian War 
made him the hero of all New England; he en- 
tered the Revolution as a general, and rose to 
be second to Washington in military rank. "His 

3 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

name," said Washington Irving, "has long been 
a favorite one with young and old; one of the 
talismanic names of the Revolution, the very men- 
tion of which is like the sound of a trumpet." He 
was the first of tlie famous men of the new nation 
to have his biography written ; he had a happy fac- 
ulty for being present at the most interesting occa- 
sions of his epoch; he was noted for his unselfish 
patriotism, for his absolutely flawless courage, for 
his hairbreadth escapes, for his kindness and jol- 
lity; so, though he had not the genius of Washing- 
ton, Hamilton or Franklin, I think American young 
people will find his career well worth reading 
about. 

The very first glimpse we have of our hero is a 
strange one ; it shows him to us upside down ! This 
is how it happened. 

When Israel was a small boy, he and some of 
the other boys of his age went birds-nesting. In 
those days of a rougher age, boys hadn't learned 
the cruelty of the sport as they have now. Israel, 
as usual, was more daring than any of his play- 
mates, and foolishly climbed out on a small limb 
till it broke beneath him. Crash ! went he ; and his 

4 










MWM^iWf^^^^' "^'^^'^ 




Early An\ exture of General Putnam 



A JOLLY BOYHOOD 

career seemed likely to end then and there! As 
he came hurtling down, however, the seat of his 
pantaloons caught on a branch in such a way that he 
hung head downward ! 

"Are you hurt, Israel ?" called his comrades anx- 
iously. 

"No," answered the unfortunate boy, "but I'm 
caught. I can't get down.'* 

"If we had a knife," said some one of the boys, 
"we could cut away the limb." 

This was a bright idea, but unfortunately it was 
of no use, as no one had a knife. Another boy 
suggested burning the tree down, a plan quite im- 
practical on the face of it. 

"Hurry up and do something," called Israel, in 
distress, his face redder than ever from a rush of 
blood to the head. "You fellows would stand there 
talking all night. I tell you it's no fun hanging 
here." 

But none of the boys could think what to do. 
Finally, Israel called out, 

"Jim Randall, is there a ball in your rifle?" 

Jim Randall, who was noted as a crack shot, sel- 
dom went out without his flintlock. The woods 

5 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

at that time were full of wild turkeys and other 
game. 

"Yes," said he. 

"Then shoot at that small limb that holds me 
here," cried Israel. 

"What? Cut you down?" asked Jim, horror- 
struck. " I might miss and shoot you." 

"Never mind. That would be better than for 
me to die by hanging, which I'll certainly do if I 
hang here much longer. Shoot, I tell you," he 
added, as Jim hesitated. 

"But you'll fall!" 

"Shoot!" 

Jim Randall brought his rifle to his shoulder, took 
careful aim, and fired. 

The splinters flew. Israel Putnam dropped to 
the ground unhurt, except for severe bruises. The 
next day he went back and got the nest — an action 
which cannot be praised except as showing a gen- 
eral tendency to perseverance ! 

Once at least during his boyhood Israel made a 
visit to Boston. It was a small town then, but it 
looked very large to the country boy. As he was 
walking along the principal street, staring at the 

6 



A JOLLY BOYHOOD 

sights, a Boston boy began making fun of his coun- 
trified appearance and behavior. Israel stood it as 
long as he could — he was never one to pick a quar- 
rel without cause — but finally, seeing that a crowd 
was collecting, he challenged his persecutor to a 
fight, and, in spite of the other's larger size, suc- 
ceeded in whipping him. The city boy slunk away, 
while the spectators applauded. 

Another story which is told of Israel happened 
some years later and concerns a practical joke 
which he played upon a slave owner. At that time 
many New Englanders owned slaves. This man, 
one of the Putnams' neighbors, had a colored fel- 
low named Cudge, who seems to have absorbed 
the New England spirit of independence into his 
blood, for he was particularly refractory. One 
day Cudge's master made up his mind to flog 
him. 

We are not told whether Israel disapproved of 
this punishment, but as he was always noted for 
his kindheartedness, he probably did. At any rate, 
when the slave owner asked his aid in flogging 
Cudge, Israel promised his help, with a mental res- 
ervation. 

7 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

"You catch him," said he, "and I will tie him for 
you." 

The farmer caught Cudge, who was in the fields, 
and brought him to the barn, where Israel was ready 
with a strong rope, one end of which he had fast- 
ened to a beam. The other he had made into a 
noose. When Cudge and his master entered, Put- 
nam, instead of slipping the noose over the black 
man alone, slipped it over both of them, master 
and man, binding their arms down tightly so that 
they could not hurt each other. Then he went off to 
give them time to appreciate the joke! After a 
while, he returned and loosed them. History does 
not say what names the slave owner called Israel; 
but Cudge escaped his whipping, and was in such 
a good humor that he was easy to manage for days 
to come. 

Another adventure of Putnam's boyhood was his 
taming of a vicious bull, which he accomplished by 
jumping on the bull's back and riding it round and 
round the pasture till the animal was exhausted. 

What of Israel Putnam's schooling during this 
rough-and-tumble, healthy, adventurous boyhood of 
his? Echo answers, "What?" To tell the truth, 

8 



A JOLLY BOYHOOD 

he received very little. There was probably no 
school near him, and as there were no cars in those 
days, few carriages, none but the roughest roads, 
mere Indian trails through the primeval forest, he 
could not attend one even a few miles distant. The 
children of his neighborhood may possibly have 
met, during the winter, at the house of some of their 
number whose father or mother volunteered to 
teach them reading, numbering, and writing. Or 
the minister may have kept school, in addition to 
his other duties. Israel probably attended some 
such class. But we know that his education did not 
go far. His letters in later days were fearful and 
wonderful, even in those times of erratic spelling 
and still more erratic capitals. Israel himself was 
ashamed of them, and when he became a general 
always had a secretary attend to his correspondence. 
When he had children of his own, you may be sure 
he saw to it that they received the education he 
lacked and of which he was beginning to feel the 
need. 

But if he lacked book knowledge, he was learn- 
ing other Important things all during his boyhood. 
He learned how to fell the mighty trees of the for- 

9 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

est, how to clear and cultivate the soil, how to care 
for cattle and horses, how to build log-houses, how 
to plant and graft fruit-trees, how to ride, and how 
to shoot. He knew from his cradle, almost, more 
woodcraft than a modern Boy Scout can possibly 
know in these days of vanished forests. And often, 
probably, he and his boy friends talked with In- 
dians, the subdued remnants of the tribes conquered 
during King Philip's War; and gathered from them 
information as to savage ways and customs which 
was to stand them in good stead later on. Often, 
too, in the evening around the log fires, Israel heard 
blood-curdling stories of the recent French and 
Indian raids upon the Maine and Massachusetts bor- 
ders, but a few miles north of Salem; he heard of 
peaceful farmers shot down in their fields by the 
lurking savages, he heard of French priests and 
French gentlemen leading their bloodthirsty allies 
on the war-path ; he heard of whole settlements mas- 
sacred in the dead of night, and of women and lit- 
tle children taken away captive through the snowy 
forests to Canada; he heard all these grim stories, 
which were only too true, and had happened but 
a few years before his birth ; and he resolved, then 

10 



A JOLLY BOYHOOD 

and there, that when he grew up he would do his 
part to protect his country from future outrages. 

So he passed through all the adventures and ex- 
citements and the hard work of a boy's life in a 
pioneer country, and grew to a sturdy and strong 
manhood. 



II 



A WOLF-HUNT AND OTHER 
MATTERS 



II 

A WOLF-HUNT AND OTHER MATTERS 

THERE were so many things to tell of 
Israel Putnam's boyhood in the first chap- 
ter, that three items most important, of 
course, .in all true and proper biographies were 
left out. They are, the date of the hero's birth, 
a description of his birthplace, and an account 
of his family, even back to the remotest an- 
cestors. 

As those are the passages the impatient reader is 
only too apt to skip, in order to reach as soon as 
possible the really interesting part of the story, we 
shall treat of them very shortly, in order not to 
subject anyone to temptation — though, after all, 
there are two or three things connected with them 
worth mentioning. 

In the first place, the Putnams were an old, es- 
tablished family in Salem, Israel's great-grand- 
father having come to America from England and 

15 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

settled here in 1641. In the second place, Israel 
Putnam, who saw the light of day on January 7, 
1 71 8, was the twelfth child of his parents, a cir- 
cumstance which ought to prove something to those 
who collect statistics about great men and small 
families. In the third place, he was born in a 
house which is still standing, and in the possession 
of the Putnam family, in Salem Village, now Dan- 
vers, Massachusetts, and this neighborhood was the 
scene, you will remember, of the famous witchcraft 
persecutions, which caused so much terror and so 
much suffering to innocent people. 

Israel's father, Joseph Putnam, was one of the 
few who dared to disapprove openly of this frenzy, 
and of the hanging of the so-called witches on the 
testimony of some hysterical children. For this rea- 
son, his life was in great danger from his excited, 
bigoted neighbors, and even from his own relatives. 
For six months, or until the witchcraft days were 
ended, he kept his flintlock loaded and ready to 
hand, and his fastest horse saddled in the stable, 
ready to make his escape in case he himself should 
be accused of the crime. The independence of spirit 
and moral courage which he showed on this occa- 

16 



A WOLF-HUNT AND OTHER MATTERS 

sion were handed down to his son Israel in no small 
measure. 

Israel's father died when Israel was five years 
old ; but a few years after he acquired a stepfather. 
This was Captain Thomas Perley, of Boxford, 
Massachusetts, a village about fifteen miles distant 
from Salem. Israel, with the rest of the younger 
children — there were six of them then — went with 
his mother to live at the house of his stepfather. 
He remained there for ten years, or the greater part 
of his boyhood. His new parent was a captain of 
the militia, and probably laid the foundations of 
Israel's military training. 

During these years, Israel by no means forgot his 
Salem friends, but visited them frequently. There 
was a special attraction for him in Old Salem. 
Can you guess what, or, rather, who it was? A 
pretty girl I Her name was Hannah Pope, and she 
was the daughter of some former neighbors of the 
Putnams. Her family, like the Putnams, had been 
among the first settlers of the village. 

In those days young people married early. There 
was no difficulty about the young men making a 
living, for the living was all around them in the 

17 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

shape of rich lands only waiting to be cultivated. 
The lot of a bachelor was a hard one without a 
woman to cook and keep house for him; and a girl 
who did not marry by the time she was twenty was 
sadly pitied, and called an "ancient maid," or, in 
Boston, a "thorn-back." 

Hannah Pope never gave anyone a chance to 
call her these uncomplimentary things. Before she 
was eighteen she had listened favorably to the blunt 
but impetuous wooing of the stalwart, black-haired, 
blue-eyed Israel Putnam, who had been her sweet- 
heart, probably, ever since she was a tiny girl work- 
ing her first sampler. In July, 1739, she and Israel 
were married in her father's house. Soon after 
the young husband took his wife to a new house 
he had built with his own hands on the portion 
of the Salem farm he had inherited from his father. 
There, about a year later, their first child was 
born, and named Israel, after his father. 

About this time settlers from Roxbury, Salem, 
Lynn, and other Massachusetts towns were moving 
out to eastern Connecticut, a part of the country 
which so far had not been settled, but where there 
were unusually fertile lands awaiting cultivation. 

18 



A WOLF-HUNT AND OTHER MATTERS 

Israel Putnam heard of this emigration, and felt 
his own pioneer blood stirring. He sold some of 
his land in Salem, and with this money bought, in 
partnership with his brother-in-law, Joseph Pope, 
a farm in the district then called "Mortlake," which 
was afterwards annexed by the town of Pomfret, 
and is now a part of Brooklyn, Connecticut. Israel 
bought it from Governor Jonathan Belcher, of Bos- 
ton. He probably made a preliminary trip there in 
1739 to look it over. In 1740 he moved his wife 
and baby there. 

We can imagine their slow journey on horseback 
over the seventy-five miles of rough trail that led 
from their old home to the new. When they ar- 
rived mother and baby were sheltered under a has- 
tily improvised shed of bark, while the men — Israel 
had a black servant with him — felled trees for the 
new house, cut the logs, hauled, notched them and 
set them in place. In a few days a substantial 
log cabin was erected, and Hannah Putnam helped 
to chink up the cracks with moss and clay. If it 
was like all the other log cabins of the period, it 
had a fireplace made of the great Connecticut bowl- 
ders, an opening which served for a window, and 

19 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

another for a door. They could have brought lit- 
tle furniture with them ; and, perhaps, for that first 
winter they sat on log stools, and slept on beds 
made from cedar and hemlock boughs. But they 
soon improved their condition. 

At the end of two years Israel was able to buy 
out his brother-in-law's share of the property, and 
had paid the whole amount of his debt to Grovemor 
Belcher. In a few years he looked around him at 
fertile fields, enclosed with stone fences, at fat, 
sleek cattle, and sheep, and goats. There was plenty 
of food on his table and in his storehouse: corn 
and pumpkins, turnips, squash, and other vegeta- 
bles, milk and cream, bacon and ham. He had 
brought apple-trees, pear-trees and other fruit 
trees from Old Salem, planted and grafted them 
with great care, and they promised soon to bear 
fruit. With the extra produce of his farm he could 
buy such furniture as they needed to make com- 
fortable a new house which he had built to take 
the place of the first log cabin. 

All this meant work, and hard work, on the 
part of the young landowner, who had only his 
negro servant to help him in the fields. His young 

20 



A WOLF-HUNT AND OTHER MATTERS 

wife did her full share in the cooking and cleaning, 
the spinning and weaving and fashioning of home- 
made clothing, milking cattle, dairy work, and baby 
tending, which filled the lives of our pioneer great- 
great-grandmothers to overflowing. Israel's family 
grew fast. Nearly every year a baby arrived, until 
the farmhouse was filled to overflowing with sturdy, 
tumbling youngsters. 

Meanwhile other settlers had been coming to the 
community, attracted by the rich farm lands. They 
soon learned to admire the sterhng qualities of 
Neighbor Putnam. An incident which occurred 
now made him truly the hero of the countryside. 
By the efforts of Putnam and others the county 
had been almost entirely rid of wild beasts; but 
there still remained one old she-wolf who was so 
wary that nobody could catch her, and who killed 
countless sheep and goats every year. Each fall 
she retreated to the forests west of them, and re- 
turned the next spring with her young whelps. One 
morning Putnam found seventy of his sheep and 
goats dead in the field, and many more poor lit- 
tle lambs and kids terribly wounded by the wolf's 
teeth and claws. This was too much! He and 

21 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

five other men agreed to hunt alternately in pairs 
until the wolf was captured and killed. Fortu- 
nately, a light snow had fallen, which made it pos- 
sible to detect her tracks, which were unmistakable, 
since one of her paws, which had been caught in 
a steel trap, was shorter than the others. 

The men followed the trail to the Connecticut 
River, and found that the wolf had turned and 
come back towards Pom fret. They turned too, 
and at three o'clock in the morning finally traced 
it to the opening of a cave, about three miles from 
Putnam's farm. There the wolf had taken refuge, 
and all their efforts to dislodge her proved futile. 
They sent in dogs — among them Putnam's old 
bloodhound — and the animals returned wounded 
and frightened, and neither coaxing nor punish- 
ment could make them go in again. An attempt 
was made to smoke the wolf out by burning straw 
and sulphur inside the entrance. No result ! 

Putnam then asked his negro if he would go in. 

The negro shook his head and rolled his eyes 
most emphatically. "Please, Massa Putnam, don* 
send dis poor nigger in dar," he begged. 

"Well," said Putnam, stripping off his coat, "Pm 

22 



A WOLF-HUNT AND OTHER MATTERS 

not going to have another coward in my family. 
I'll go in." 

He had the others fetch him some strips of 
birch-bark for torches, and tie a long rope around 
his legs, so that they could pull him out when he 
kicked it as a signal. Then he got down on his 
hands and knees and crawled into the slippery 
hole. 

The cave is described by Major Humphreys, Put- 
nam's earliest biographer, who visited it during 
Putnam's lifetime, as being about two feet square 
and very slippery with ice at the opening ; it de- 
scended obliquely fifteen feet, then ran horizontally 
ten more, then ascended gradually sixteen feet 
towards its end. It was not high enough in any 
place for a man to stand upright, nor was it more 
than three feet wide in any place. This "Wolf's 
Hole" is still pointed out to visitors in Pomfret, 
Connecticut. 

Putnam crawled in, in absolute darkness except 
for the circle of light cast by his flaring torch. On 
and on he went, until, at the very end of the cavern, 
he saw two balls of fire glaring at him. They 
were the eyes of the wolf. Upon seeing the torch 

23 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

she growled horribly. Putnam kicked the rope, 
as a signal to his friends to pull him out. They 
thought him in danger, and obeyed in such haste 
that his shirt was stripped over his head and he 
was badly cut in passage. Nevertheless, he pre- 
pared to enter a second time. He loaded his gun 
with nine buckshot, and with it in one hand and 
the torch in the other painfully crawled towards the 
wolf. 

When he drew near her she howled, rolled her 
eyes, snapped her teeth, and dropped her head be- 
tween her legs in preparation to spring. There 
was not an instant to be lost. Putnam raised his 
gun to his shoulder and fired at her head. There 
was a deafening report — a violent "kick" from the 
gun — smoke filled the narrow cave to suffocation 
— and before he knew clearly what had happened, 
Putnam found himself outside the cave, pulled 
there by his anxious friends while still stunned from 
the shock of the discharge in such narrow quar- 
ters. 

He waited for the smoke to clear away; a third 
time he went in, not knowing yet whether the 
wolf were killed or all the more savage on account 

24 



A WOLF-HUNT AND OTHER MATTERS 

of wounds. But when he approached her this time 
she lay motionless. He put the torch to her nose 
and found that she was dead. He took hold of 
her ears, kicked the rope, and was pulled out for 
the third time, dragging his trophy with him. A 
shout went up from the spectators. Putnam and 
his prize were made the center of an excited throng, 
who escorted them to a house nearby, where a 
"wolf-jubilee" was held. The wolf's carcass was 
hung to a spike driven into a beam, and for days 
the colonists came from far and wide to view the 
body of their late enemy and praise the spirit of 
the man who had slain her. 

With this exploit Putnam's fame for courage was 
firmly established; he was called "Old Wolf Put- 
nam"; and when the Revolution began, compari- 
sons were made between his early adventure and 
his readiness to attack the "British Wolf" in its den. 

But we are still a long way from the Revolution. 
The wolf episode occurred not long after the year 
1740. Years of peaceful home life and profitable 
farming lay before the young colonist; and after 
that he was to fight in many stirring battles and 
skirmishes for his mother country before he cast 

25 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

aside forever her uniform, and gave his hean and 
his sword to the cause of hberty. 

These peaceful years bore fruit, not in events of 
interest to the story-teller, but in prosperity and 
happiness. Putnam's children were growing up 
around him, his wealth was increasing yearly, and 
he had every inducement to stay at home, when, 
suddenly, the war-clouds grew darker and darker 
on the horizon, the first skirmishing shots, like 
the patter of hail of a coming storm, rang from 
the Ohio Valley, and the New England men were 
called upon to defend their frontier in a campaign 
against the French and Indians in the Lake Cham- 
plain region. 

Israel Putnam was one of the first to respond to 
the call to arms in Connecticut. 



Ill 

BATTLE OF LAKE GEORGE 



Ill 

BATTLE OF LAKE GEORGE 

EARLY in the summer of 1755 the new house 
on the Putnam farm witnessed the first of 
many partings. Israel, the oldest boy, now 
a well-grown lad of sixteen, lifted the flintlock from 
its accustomed place over the mantel, and handed 
it to his father. 

"Remember what I've told you about the farm- 
ing, son," said Israel the elder, "and help your 
mother all you can in every way." 

"Don't cry, Hannah," he said to his wife, ten- 
derly kissing her. "I'll be back in no time, just as 
soon as we've put those rascally Frenchmen where 
they belong." 

The younger children clustered about, hardly 
comprehending why their father was going to leave 
them. 

"He's going to fight the Indians," whispered the 
next oldest boy to a little sister — at which the lat- 

29 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

ter began to cry. It was not strange the word 
Indian should frighten her out of her wits, for 
she had heard many terrible and true stories about 
them. 

"There, there," said her father, soothing her, "be 
a brave girl. See, father has his gun and his 
hatchet, and no Indian will dare come near him." 
Then, to divert her mind, "Fetch my powder-horn 
from that nail where it hangs. Now — I'm ready! 
I don't look much like a real soldier yet, maybe — 
but I surely will by the time I get back from the 
campaign." 

Indeed, Israel, like most of the other Connecti- 
cut volunteers in the Crown Point campaign, looked 
anything but soldierlike. He wore his ordinary 
farming clothes, carried only his flintlock, hatchet 
and powder-horn, with one of Hannah's home-spun 
blankets strapped at his back, to keep him warm 
on cold nights. After taking a final farewell of 
his family, he made his way down the path under 
the apple trees, through the gate in the stone fence, 
and out into the road. 

Presently he met other volunteers going in the 
same direction, and joined the main body some- 

30 



BATTLE OF LAKE GEORGE 

where on the road to Albany. Their general was 
Phineas Lyman. He had been a tutor at Yale, then 
a lawyer, and now he was an officer who knew lit- 
tle more about soldiering than the men under him, 
but he was courageous and had good common sense. 
The other officers were mainly men chosen by the 
soldiers themselves from their own friends and 
acquaintances, and this made discipline difficult at 
times. One of them was Colonel Ephraim Wil- 
liams, who made his will at Albany, leaving a sum 
of money to found the school which has since be- 
come Williams College; another was Lieutenant- 
Colonel Seth Pomeroy, a gunsmith from Northamp- 
ton. After many days' march through the woods, 
the volunteers arrived at the little Dutch town of 
Albany, where they encamped on the "Flats" and 
meadows below the town. 

They found here several hundred Mohawk In- 
dians, friends of William Johnson, the commander 
of the whole army. These red men, hideously 
painted, with feathers in their hair, were enjoying 
themselves to their hearts' content, eating and 
drinking as much as possible at the expense of their 
allies. Johnson, to please them, let them paint his 

31 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

face, too; he danced the war-dance with them, and 
cut with his own sword the first slice from the 
ox which had been roasted whole for their feast. 
Johnson was an Irishman who lived in the Mo- 
hawk valley, and was such a favorite with the 
savages that they had made him a Mohawk chief. 
It was mainly his influence which kept them from 
going over to the French side. 

The army stayed in camp near Albany till mid- 
summer, far too long a time to please the impa- 
tient Putnam and his friends. The delay was due 
to friction and bad management among the colo- 
nies. They had not yet learned how to pull to- 
gether. 

During this waiting the news of Braddock's de- 
feat at the hands of French and Indians in the 
Ohio Valley spread a gloom over the camp. The 
English soldiers falling by regiments from the bul- 
lets which whizzed from among the trees — not an 
enemy to be seen! It was terrible! "The Lord 
have mercy on poor New England !" one of the vol- 
unteers wrote home. 

And now the turn of the New England men 
was coming. Toward midsummer news was 

32 



BATTLE OF LAKE GEORGE 

brought by Mohawk scouts that Baron Dieskau, a 
German baron in the service of the French, was 
approaching Crown Point from Canada with eight 
thousand men. Johnson set his army on the move. 
Putnam was one of those who advanced up the 
Hudson to a spot called the Great Carrying Place, 
where they set to work to build a fort called Fort 
Lyman, afterwards changed to Fort Edward. He 
was with a large detachment which moved from 
there across country to Lake George, a distance 
of fourteen miles. They marched through the thick 
forest, the axmen going in front to cut down trees 
to make a rough road for the others, who guided 
the train of Dutch wagons. In twenty-four hours 
they reached Lake George, that beautiful sheet 
of water near which so many exciting things were 
to happen. 

They encamped there, and began to throw up 
earthworks. Three hundred Mohawks came to join 
them. On the following Sunday the Indians had 
to hear a long sermon, preached by one of the 
army chaplains, and dealing with theology which 
was quite over their heads, even when translated 
by the interpreter. But they listened with great 

33 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

courtesy, for their politeness in such matters put 
white people to shame. 

Another week went by. The next Sunday was a 
beautiful day, fair and warm, with light showers. 
Toward sunset, after the prayers and sermons 
were over, an Indian scout came in with the re- 
port that he had found the trail of a body of men — 
Dieskau's army — moving from South Bay (a small 
lake to the west of Lake Champlain, and emptying 
into it) toward Fort Lyman. Johnson sent out 
a scout to reconnoiter and warn those at Fort Ly- 
man. He did not, apparently, imagine that the en- 
emy would attack his own camp. 

The poor scout on his way to Fort Lyman was 
killed by the Indians of Dieskau's army. Dieskau 
had meant to attack Crown Point, but on read- 
ing the letter which the scout had carried, de- 
cided to move upon Lake George instead. He 
understood that the force there was large; but — 
"the more there are, the more we shall kill!" he 
exclaimed. 

Meanwhile Johnson and his officers had decided 
to send out two detachments of five hundred men 
each, through the forest, to catch Dieskau's men in 

34 



BATTLE OF LAKE GEORGE 

their retreat. Hendrick, the chief of the Mohawks, 
disapproved of this plan. He picked up a stick 
and broke it; then he picked up several sticks, and 
showed that together they could not be broken. 
The officers grasped his meaning, and Johnson or- 
dered the two detachments to be joined into one. 
Still the wise old Indian shook his head. "If 
they are to be killed, they are too many," he said; 
"if they are to fight, they are too few." But in 
spite of his disapproval, he decided to go with them^ 
and as he was too old and fat to walk, the English 
gave him a horse, which he rode at the head of the 
column. Two hundred of his warriors accompa- 
nied the party. 

Putnam was one of the soldiers in this detach- 
ment. About eight o'clock on Monday morning 
they left camp, under the command of Colonel 
Ephraim Williams. They advanced along the 
rugged valley in which their camp lay. There was 
no open ground but the rough road along which they 
marched. To the left of them were dense thickets ; 
to the right, woody slopes. 

Suddenly, when they were about three miles 
from camp, old Hendrick in the front detected some 

35 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

sign — a rustle of a leaf or breaking of a twig, which 
warned him that the enemy was near. It was too 
late to warn the others. The French and Indian 
advance guard of Dieskau's army was all around 
them, concealed in the thickets at the left and the 
slopes at the right, so that not a man nor a gun was 
visible. From the left side spattered a murderous 
fire. The column doubled up, as Dieskau said after- 
ward, "like a pack of cards." Hendrick fell dead, 
and so did Colonel Williams. The men in the rear 
ran forward to the help of their comrades, when 
suddenly a sharp fire from the slopes on the right 
opened upon them. The men retreated in a panic; 
but a part of Williams' regiment, under Lieutenant- 
Colonel Whiting, rallied and covered the retreat of 
the rest by firing from behind trees like the French 
and Indians, then falling back and firing again. 
Putnam was one of these quick-witted and brave 
soldiers. "And a very handsome retreat they 
made," writes Pomeroy, "and so continued till they 
came within about three quarters of a mile of 
our camp. This was the last fire our men gave 
our enemies, which killed great numbers of them; 
they were seen to drop as pigeons." This affair was 

36 



BATTLE OF LAKE GEORGE 

long called by New Englanders "the Bloody Morn- 
ing Scout." 

Putnam had escaped scot free. He now joined 
those in the fort who were preparing for the at- 
tack. They threw up a barricade of wagons, boats, 
trunks of trees, anything that came handy, behind 
which the men could stand, crouch, or lie flat. Dies- 
kau had paused about a mile from the camp to col- 
lect his forces. Soon they appeared — the regulars 
in the road in regular platoons, the French and In- 
dians at the sides, running helter-skelter through 
the woods, shouting, yelling, and firing from behind 
trees. Those in the fort responded. Seth Pomeroy 
wrote to his wife : "Perhaps the hailstones from 
heaven were never much thicker than their bullets 
came ; but, blessed be God ! that did not in the least 
daunt or disturb us." Johnson was wounded, and 
retired to his tent. Lyman took command. The 
battle raged furiously for four hours. Putnam, 
though his courage never faltered, must have felt 
about it as did a comrade of his who wrote to his 
wife: "It was the most awful day my eyes ever 
beheld; there seemed to be nothing but thunder 
and lightning and perpetual pillars of smoke." 

37 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

At length DIeskau was wounded, and the French 
began to give way. Putnam and the other fighting 
farmers, raw recruits though they were, saw their 
advantage, leaped over their barricade, and fell 
upon them, using hatchets and the butts of their 
guns as weapons. The French were entirely routed. 
Dieskau was carried prisoner into Johnson's camp, 
where his wounds were dressed by order of the 
general before those of Johnson himself. Johnson's 
Mohawks meanwhile held a long and angry conver- 
sation with Johnson in his tent. They were not at 
all satisfied with the outcome. 

Putnam heard afterward that Dieskau had asked 
Johnson what they wanted. 

"What do they want?" answered Johnson. "To 

burn you, by G , eat you, and smoke you in their 

pipes, in revenge for three or four of their chiefs 
that were killed. But never fear; you shall be safe 
with me, or else they shall kill us both." He put 
a strong guard around Dieskau and in the morning 
sent him with a large escort to Fort Lyman, whence 
he was sent to Albany, and then to New York. 
Johnson's conduct on this occasion is of particular 
interest when compared with that of the French 

38 



BATTLE OF LAKE GEORGE 

officers at Ticonderoga, which will be described 
later. 

So ended the battle of Lake George, Putnam's 
first engagement — his "baptism of fire." The pro- 
vincial soldiers, according to contemporary testi- 
mony, "in the morning fought like good boys, about 
noon like men, and in the afternoon like devils." 
None had been stauncher or braver than Putnam. 
He was rewarded by soon after receiving his com- 
mission as second Lieutenant in one of the newly- 
arrived Connecticut regiments. 



IV 
RANGING 



rv 

RANGING 

WHO is that man?" asked Putnam one 
day of a fellow soldier, pointing to a 
tall, sinewy stranger, in rough woods- 
man's clothes, who had that day come to camp and 
been admitted to General Johnson's tent. 

"That? Oh, that's Robert Rogers, the ranger 
— the man that knows as much about the woods 
as any Indian varmint alive," answered his com- 
rade. *'Used to be a smuggler, they say," he went 
on, lowering his voice, "and between you and me, 
he's been mixed up in some pretty queer businesses. 
A hard customer, but brave — there's no man braver 
than Bob Rogers. He knows how to fight the In- 
dians, and how to find out all the secrets of the 
Frenchies yonder at Ticonderoga, So Johnson's 
going to make him a Major, I hear, and put him at 
the head of a corps of sharpshooters who're not 
skeered to beat the Indians at their own game. 

43 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

Come to think of it, Put," drawled the Yankee slyly, 
"you'd be pretty good at that sort of work your- 
self. You can see and hear pretty near as good as 
an Indian now, you're a good shot, and you ain't 
afraid of much, that's a fact." 

Putnam laughed, and did not answer. Not long 
after he met Rogers, and the two men struck up 
an acquaintance. Rogers discovered that Putnam 
had the qualities of an ideal ranger, and before 
the summer was over he arranged that he join his 
band. Another valued officer in the rangers was 
John Stark, of New Hampshire. 

The following interesting description of the life 
of the rangers is from Parkman's "Montcalm and 
Wolfe." "The best of them [the rangers] were 
commonly employed on Lake George; and nothing 
can surpass the adventurous hardihood of their 
lives. Summer and winter, day and night were 
alike to them. Embarked in whale-boats or birch 
canoes, they glided under the silent moon or in the 
languid glare of a breathless August day, when 
islands floated in dreamy haze, and the hot air was 
thick with odors of the pine; or in the bright Oc- 
tober, when the jay screamed from the woods, squir- 

44 



RANGING 

rels gathered their winter hoard, and congregated 
blackbirds chattered farewell to their summer 
haunts; when gay mountains basked in light, ma- 
ples dropped leaves of rustling gold, sumachs 
glowed like rubies under the dark green of the un- 
changing spruce, and mossed rocks with all their 
unpainted plumage lay double in the watery mirror : 
that festal evening of the year, when jocund Na- 
ture disrobes herself, to wake again refreshed in 
the joy of her undying spring. Or, in the tomb-like 
silence of the winter forest, with breath frozen on 
his beard, the ranger strode on snow-shoes over 
the spotless drifts; and, like Durer's knight, a 
ghastly death stalked ever at his side. There were 
those among them for whom this stem life had a 
fascination that made all other existence seem 
tame." 

Putnam's quick wit, courage and strength soon 
made him conspicuous in this service, and his ad- 
ventures were many. Here is one of them. 

One night he and Lieutenant Robert Durkee 
were sent to reconnoiter the enemy's camp at a 
place in the forest called The Ovens, near Ticon- 
deroga. It was black as pitch, and as they made 

45 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

their way through the woods not a sound was to 
be heard but the hooting of some owl or the rustle 
of a startled rabbit. Putnam and Durkee walked 
noiselessly ; they had learned how to avoid even the 
breaking of a twig which might betray them to 
some lurking Indian. Presently they saw the glow 
of fires and knew they were near the enemy's camp. 
They crept nearer on their hands and knees, for 
it was their bold plan to get inside the circle of 
fires, which they supposed the French, like the 
English, placed at the outside of their camp. 

Suddenly a voice cried, "Qui vivef a gun 
cracked sharply, and the darkness became alive with 
dim figures. The American rangers were in the 
heart of the French camp. The latter, they learned, 
posted their fires in the center, not the outside, of 
their camp. 

The sentinel's bullets whistled about their ears. 
Savages hurled their tomahawks. Putnam never 
knew exactly v/hat happened next, but in a moment 
he found himself out of the crowd and running 
through the woods, dodging dark trunks of trees 
and tearing his clothing on the underbrush. He 
could hear footsteps close behind him, and could 

46 



RANGING 

almost feel the pursuer's breath on his neck. Soon 
his foot tripped, and he fell headlong into a soft, 
sticky pit. Crash! came the other man on top of 
him. Quick as a flash, Putnam grasped his toma- 
hawk. He was just about to bring it down on the 
skull of the other, when a familiar voice exclaimed, 
"Stop! it's Durkee!" 

Putnam's hand fell limp, and he whispered, "You 
said that just in time." 

"One of the devils got me in the thigh," said 
Durkee, "but I managed to run in spite of it. Put, 
have you got a drink anywhere about you?" 

Putnam cautiously twisted around and got hold 
of his canteen. He gave it to Durkee, but the othei, 
after raising it eagerly to his lips, put it down with 
a low exclamation of disgust. "Not a drop in it," 
he whispered. 

Putnam felt of it and found a bullet-hole. He 
was glad the canteen had it instead of himself. He 
and Durkee crawled out of the clay-pit and hid be- 
hind some rocky ledges all night. In the morning 
Putnam found that the blanket which he had worn 
folded at his back had fourteen bullet holes in it! 

They cautiously made their way back to camp 
47 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

and arrived unharmed. They had found out what 
they wanted to know about the position and strength 
of the enemy at "The Ovens" — but "The Ovens" 
had been a hot place for them! 

As fall came on, the men at Fort Lyman and 
Lake George grumbled and shivered in their thin 
summer clothing with but one blanket apiece. The 
rain water stood in their tents; and the sick, of 
whom there were many, suffered terribly from the 
cold and wet weather. Discipline among these 
obstinate, independent New Englanders was very 
poor, and they were just about to mutiny and take 
French leave when the welcome order came to break 
camp. 

Some soldiers and officers, however, had to stay 
to guard the newly built forts. Few volunteered for 
this disagreeable duty — but one of those who did so 
was Israel Putnam. Day after day he saw his 
friends and comrades leave for home; and he was 
homesick as he watched them. He knew that, dur- 
ing the winter nights to follow, while he scouted 
the snowy forests, or shivered in the gloomy fort, 
they would be sitting around their blazing hearths, 
telling stories of the summer campaign to admiring 

48 



RANGING 

listeners. He, too, had a comfortable home and a 
family who wished him back ; but his country's need 
was always first to Israel Putnam, and he served 
her with a whole-hearted devotion that cold and 
heat and peril could not shake. 

The long winter dragged on. By day and night 
the rangers, with fur caps on their heads and thick 
mittens on their hands, scouted in the neighborhood 
of Lake George, now stealing on snow-shoes 
through the forest, now gliding on skates over the 
icy floor of the lake. They were invaluable in keep- 
ing watch of the enemy and harassing them by 
guerrilla warfare. Some also were at work on the 
forts and the road between the Hudson River and 
Lake George. 

Putnam was relieved from service on May 30, 
1756, and granted by the Connecticut Assembly 
"fifty mill'd dollars ... as gratuity for . . . ex- 
traordinary services and good conduct in ranging 
and scouting the winter past for the annoyance 
of the enemy near Crown Point and discovery of 
their motions." 

He returned home, at last, to the great delight of 
his family; there was a tiny baby there whom he 

49 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

had never seen — his daughter Eunice — who had 
been born during the winter. How eagerly the 
children must have gathered about him, to hear 
the stories of his exciting adventures! 

It was only during this month of May, 1756, that 
war was formally declared between France and 
England, after a year of preliminary fighting on 
this continent. Putnam had but a short time to 
enjoy himself with his family. In June he re- 
turned to the Hudson, where the volunteers were 
mustering for an attack on Ticonderoga and Crown 
Point, He was now a Captain of the Fourth Com- 
pany in Lyman's Regiment. 



THE DISAPPEARING SENTINEL 
AND OTHER ADVENTURES 



V 

THE DISAPPEARING SENTINEL AND OTHER 
ADVENTURES 



T 



■^HE great general, Montcalm, who had 
taken the place of the wounded Dieskau 
as commander-in-chief of the French 
forces, lay at Ticonderoga, on Lake Champlain, the 
most advanced post of the French, which he had 
strongly garrisoned. The English called it a "hor- 
net's nest," and it lived up to its name, for swarms 
of French and Indians poured out from it, lurked 
in the woods all about, and made the service along 
Lake George and the upper Hudson even more dan- 
gerous than before. 

Putnam was again at Fort Edward. Every 
night, for several nights in succession, the sentinel 
standing at one of the posts had been fired upon 
and killed by an unseen enemy. Strict precau- 
tions were ordered. The sentinel was commanded 
to call out, upon hearing even the slightest noise 

53 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

in the bushes, "Who goes there?" and if no one 
answered, to fire instantly. In spite of this, the 
sentinels continued to disappear. Finally, even the 
bravest men in camp declined to volunteer for such 
dangerous duty. They were about to draft men, 
when Putnam, who, as a commissioned officer, was 
not in line for this service, volunteered to take 
the post. He was accordingly made sentinel for 
the night, and stationed himself at the spot. 

Toward midnight he heard a faint crackling in 
the bushes. It was so slight that another would 
not have noticed it, or would have thought it caused 
by some animal; but Putnam was by this time too 
well trained in scouting work to let such a sound 
escape him. He called rapidly three times, "Who 
goes there?" then raised his gtm and fired in the 
direction of the sound. He heard a groan, and 
going to the spot discovered a large Indian, one 
of the western Pottawattomies, dressed in a bear- 
skin, with a quiver full of arrows. The rascal had 
received his death-wound. He had been the cause 
of the disappearing sentinels, and with him the 
trouble ceased. 

From time to time large bands of half-savage 

54 



THE DISAPPEARING SENTINEL 

Canadians, and Indians wrapped in colored 
blankets, with lances or guns in their hands, painted 
and decked with feathers, approached by way of 
South Bay and Wood Creek, to inflict as much 
harm as they could on outlying divisions of the 
English. An English provision train was attacked 
during the summer, halfway between Fort Edward 
and the fort at the foot of Lake George, called 
Fort William Henry, by six hundred of these ma- 
rauders, and much booty was carried off. Rogers 
and Putnam with one hundred volunteers were or- 
dered to go in boats down Lake George, then to 
leave the boats, and cross by land to the Narrows 
of Lake Champlain, where they were to try to in- 
tercept the enemy. 

They executed the movement as directed with 
such speed that they reached the Narrows half an 
hour before the retreating French and Indians. 
When the latter's boats came in view, the rangers 
opened fire on them from the bushes, stopped many, 
and would have captured all if the wind had not 
blown the boats rapidly beyond gunshot into South 
Bay. Those who escaped carried the news of the 
attack to Ticonderoga, and a detachment was at 

55 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

once sent out to cut off the rangers on their way- 
back to Fort Edward. These missed the rangers 
during the night, but discovered them the next day 
on Lake George, near Sabbath-Day Point. Both 
parties had taken to their boats — the French and 
Indians were about three hundred in number and 
sure of easy victory. But the rangers waited un- 
til the opponents were within pistol shot, and then 
fired with such effect with their wall-pieces, blunder- 
busses, and small arms that the French and Indians 
were routed and retreated to Ticonderoga. One 
ranger only was killed and two slightly wounded, 
while the loss on the other side was very heavy. 
Putnam used this practice of not firing till the 
enemy were near to good effect in several of his 
Revolutionary battles, notably that of Bunker 
Hill. 

Toward the end of the summer the English 
and Colonials at Fort Edward heard of Montcalm's 
brilliant victory and their own disastrous defeat at 
Oswego. This meant that the English must give 
up for the present their scheme of attacking Fort 
Niagara and Fort Frontenac (at the site of Kings- 
ton, Ontario) — and it meant, too, that Montcalm 

56 



THE DISAPPEARING SENTINEL 

could concentrate all his men at Ticonderoga and 
Crown Point. Webb, the incompetent general who 
had been sent from England to be commander-in- 
chief of the American forces, was so frightened that 
he abandoned his plan of attacking Ticonder- 
oga, and ordered the forces to make a stand at 
Port William Henry, at the very foot of Lake 
George. 

The season of 1756 drew to a close, while French 
and English watched each other defiantly from op- 
posite ends of Lake Champlain. There were no 
more battles, but the rangers were especially active 
on the English side. Putnam was among the most 
noted of them. General Winslow, the commander 
at Lake George, wrote Loudon that Putnam re- 
turned In October "from the best scout yet made." 
"Being a man of strict truth," he adds, "he may be 
entirely trusted." Putnam had set out on Lake 
George in a whaleboat with six men, rowed to a 
point on the east side, opposite the place where 
Hague, New York, now stands, and, hiding his boat 
there, had struck across country northeast toward 
Lake Champlain. He and his men, in spite of the 
French and Indians with which the woods were 

57 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

swarming, managed to come within three miles of 
Ticonderoga. They climbed a high mountain and 
reconnoitered it thoroughly. They descended the 
mountain, and, getting still nearer the fort, saw 
three Frenchmen, whom they chased until the latter 
escaped inside the French lines. Then Putnam and 
his men climbed the mountain again and went west 
on the top of the ridge, taking in every detail of 
the enemy's outposts between Ticonderoga and 
Lake George. This was certainly scouting reduced 
to a fine art! 

November i, 1756, Montcalm's forces began their 
retreat to Canada to spend the winter. Ticon- 
deroga was left with a guard of five or six com- 
panies. Winslow's men also melted away, the regu- 
lars being sent to Philadelphia, New York, and Bos- 
ton, where they were quartered, the provincials 
gladly hastening to their New England homes. Put- 
nam probably went with the latter. He had fairly 
earned his vacation ; and there is no mention of 
his name in the activities of the rangers during the 
coming winter. 

He took home with him a powder-horn, which 
his children examined eagerly. It had been carved 

58 



THE DISAPPEARING SENTINEL 

in camp by one of the soldiers, and had the fol- 
lowing inscription: 

CAPT. ISRAEL PUTNAm's HORN MADE AT FORT WM. 
HENRY NOV'r IOTH A. D. I756 

There was also carved upon it a rough map 
of the route of the army from Albany to Lake 
George, showing the stations and forts. Below 
were the capitals WAR, with some curious de- 
signs between them. There was also carved on 
it the stanza: 

When bows and weighty spears were used in Fight 
Twere nervous limbs Declrd [declared] a man of might 
But now Gun-powder scorns such strength to own 
And Heroes not by Limbs but souls are shown. 

How glad the children must have been that they 
had a real hero for a father! This powder-horn 
is still in existence and is owned by a great-grand- 
son of Putnam's — Israel Waldo Putnam, of Rock- 
land, Ohio. He has also a pair of pistols with 
holsters, a magnet, and a brass bullet-mold of the 
famous ranger's. 



VI 
HARASSING MONTCALM 



VI 

HARASSING MONTCALM 

IT was a wonderful, still, moonlight night in 
the early summer of 1757. A silver path was 
splashed on the quiet water of South Bay, mak- 
ing the woods which rose steeply on each side of 
the narrow stream look very dark by comparison. 
Presently might have been heard, if the bank con- 
cealed any listeners, the faint drip-drip of paddles. 
A line of Indian canoes stole silently down the nar- 
row stream. They were manned chiefly with In- 
dians, dark-skinned, half-naked, their bravery of 
war-paint and feathers, and their crafty, fierce coun- 
tenances plainly visible in the moonlight. In the 
foremost canoe was a man of a different species — 
an officer, dressed in a rough woodland uniform. 
It was Marin, the famous partisan leader. 

A sound from the west bank, trivial but startling 
in its result, broke the stillness. It was but the 
click of a fire-lock upon stone, but it spoke to those 

63 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

in the canoes as loudly as if it had been a cannon 
shot. 

"0-\vis-s-sh !" hissed Marin, sharply, with a pro- 
longed whistle of his breath through his teeth. It 
was an Indian signal. The line of canoes huddled 
together like a flock of frightened sheep. Suddenly 
from the high western bank sounded a single gun 
shot. At once a volley echoed it. The bullets fell 
thick and fast upon the French and Indians in the 
canoes, easy targets in the moonlight. Many fell 
back into the boats, groaning. The rest, confused 
at the sudden attack, and unable to see their ad- 
versaries, fired wildly in the direction of the sounds. 
The firing from the ledge continued, but the French 
soon discovered from its comparative infrequency 
that the body of men concealed there must be small. 
They on their side numbered five hundred. Marin 
gave orders for his men to land and surround the 
firing party. 

The leader of this was no other than Israel Put- 
nam. He had returned to Fort Edward in the 
early summer, and finding that the rangers' ser- 
vices were still indispensable, had taken up the work 
again with his usual activity. He was now at the 

64 



HARASSING MONTCALM 

head of a band of only sixty men, who had con- 
cealed themselves behind a stone parapet on the 
west bank they had built and covered with pine 
trees for the purpose. From this ambuscade they 
had been watching for some hours for the arrival 
of the much larger force of French and Indians 
they knew were on their way to harass the English. 

Anticipating that the enemy would attempt to 
surround him, Putnam early in the fight sent small 
detachments up and down the shore to prevent them. 
These succeeded in repulsing the French all night, 
while those behind the ledge kept up their galling 
fire. At dawn, however, the enemy succeeded in 
landing. Putnam and his party were now in great 
danger, as their numbers were so much smaller, 
and they had only a short supply of ammunition 
left. Putnam accordingly gave the order to "swing 
their packs." They retired rapidly up Wood Creek, 
with the loss only of three men, while the French 
and Indians lost half their number. It was the 
greatest victory any of the scouting parties had 
won during the war. 

On the way back to Fort Edward shots suddenly 
rang through the woods and one of Putnam's men 

65 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

was wounded. Putnam gave the word for his men 
to charge. They were about to do so when a voice 
cried, "Stop! We are friends," and one of Put- 
nam's provincial comrades, also a ranger, plunged 
through the bushes with his men. They were out 
for a scouting trip, and he had recognized Putnam's 
voice as he gave the order to fire in time to prevent 
the disaster. 

"Friends or enemies," shouted Putnam, 
brusquely, "you all deserve to be hanged for not 
killing more, when you had so fair a shot!" 

About a month later Putnam and his rangers 
were stationed on an island in the Hudson not far 
from Fort Edward, when they heard the sound of 
firing from near the fort, and knew a band of 
the enemy must be attacking. Without an instant's 
delay Putnam plunged into the river, calling his 
men to follow him, and swam or waded across. On 
the other bank, near the fort, was a swamp. Here 
a party of fifteen men from the fort, under guard 
of fifty regular soldiers, had been cutting timber. 
Suddenly an arrow from the thickets had whizzed 
above the head of one of them. He gave the alarm, 
when two hundred men, chiefly Indians, under Ma- 

66 



HARASSING MONTCALM 

rin, began firing from the bushes at the unfortu- 
nate workmen and soldiers. 

Those in the fort closed the gates, and called in 
the outposts. Putnam and his men arrived to find 
that the men in the swamp were being left to the 
mercy of the much larger force of French and In- 
dians. There was no hesitation in Putnam's mind. 
He hastened at once to their rescue. As he passed 
the fort General Lyman, unwilling to see him and 
his men sacrificed, mounted the parapet and called 
to him to go no further. 

Putnam had not yet learned that in war obedi- 
ence to a superior officer is the first of all the vir- 
tues. He disregarded the General's command and 
marched on to the assistance of the harassed party. 
After fighting for an hour, he led a sudden charge 
into the swamp where the Indians were concealed. 
Surprised at the attack, they gave way, and Put- 
nam and his men chased them into full retreat. On 
this occasion Lyman overlooked the crime of his 
rash subordinate. The same afternoon Putnam was 
put in command of two hundred men and sent in 
further pursuit of the enemy. The following ac- 
count of his tactics is from the pen of Rufus Put- 

^7 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

nam, a talented young cousin of Israel's. He was 
eighteen years of age, and had joined the provincial 
army at the beginning of this year's campaign. 

"We marched on the Indian trail until sunset; 
Captain Putnam then ordered three of us to follow 
the trail a mile or more farther and there lie close 
till it was quite dark, and to observe if any came 
back, 'for,' said he, *if they do not embark in their 
boats tonight, they will send a party back to see if 
they are pursued.' We went according to orders, 
but made no discovery. And here I would remark 
that Captain Putnam's precaution struck my mind 
very forcibly as a maxim always to be observed, 
whether you are pursuing or pursued by an enemy, 
especially in the woods. It was the first idea of 
generalship that I remember to have treasured up." 

On the next day, July 24, Putnam and his rang- 
ers returned, "having discovered an encampment 
of about five hundred or six hundred men near Fort 
Anne." This was an old fort halfway up Lake 
George, which had been used in former wars, and 
was now abandoned and falling into decay. 

General Webb was especially uneasy at this time, 
for many of his soldiers had been taken away by 

68 



HARASSING MONTCALM 

General Loudon in an attack on Louisbourg, in 
Cape Breton Harbor, and with the small forces he 
had left he feared an attack from Montcalm. 
Rumors had reached him that Montcalm was gath- 
ering his forces at Ticonderoga for an attack upon 
Fort William Henry, at the lower end of Lake 
George. He accordingly set out under the escort 
of Putnam and some men to reconnoiter. When 
the party reached Fort William Henry, they found 
that the rangers there had been unsuccessful in their 
attempts to reconnoiter at night. Putnam wished 
to undertake the task in broad daylight, with only 
five men. Webb thought this too dangerous, but 
finally allowed him to take eighteen volunteers 
down Lake George in three whale-boats. On this 
expedition Putnam's party had a narrow escape. 
They were hotly pursued by a swarm of French 
and Indians in canoes, but managed to get away. 
Putnam had seen enough to convince him that 
the rumors about Montcalm's intentions were true. 
He informed Webb of his opinion. Webb agreed 
with him, but told him not to speak of his discov- 
eries to anyone else, and to prepare to return to 
Fort Edward with him at once. 

69 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

"What!" exclaimed Putman, too blunt to hide 
his astonishment. "Your Excellency does not in- 
tend to neglect so fair an opportunity of giving 
battle should the enemy presume to land?" 

"What do you think we should do here?" re- 
turned the General curtly. He was by no means so 
anxious for the fray as was his brave subordinate. 

Putnam reluctantly escorted the cautious General 
back to Fort Edward. There the latter, who found 
himself more at home in writing than fighting, 
penned a letter to the Governor of New York, ask- 
ing for militia reenforcements. 

"I am determined to march to Fort William 
Henry with the whole army under my command as 
soon as I shall hear of the farther approach of the 
enemy," he declared boldly. You will see how well 
he lived up to his resolution. Meanwhile he sent 
one thousand men, with valuable baggage and camp 
equipment, to Fort William Henry, in spite of Put- 
nam's remonstrances. Putnam seems to have had a 
premonition that the fort would be taken. He 
longed, however, to be of use there, and fairly ate 
his heart out with impatience when Webb kept him 
at Fort Edward. 

70 



VII 

THE TRAGEDY OF FORT WILLIAM 
HENRY 



VII 

THE TRAGEDY OF FORT WILLIAM HENRY 

IN the meantime all that Putnam had surmised, 
and more, was taking place at Ticonderoga. 
All that spring Montcalm had been busy- 
gathering his Indian allies, singing the war-song 
with them and listening with forced patience to 
their interminable speeches. More than one thou- 
sand Indians from the West and North, some of 
whom had never before visited a French settlement, 
were gathered in Montreal. They were eager to see 
the great chief who had taken Oswego. One of 
them, surprised at Montcalm's short height, had ad- 
dressed him thus : 

"We wanted to see the famous man who tram- 
ples the English under his feet. We thought we 
should find him so tall that his head would be lost 
in the clouds. But you are a little man, my Father. 
It is when we look into your eyes that we see the 
greatness of the pine-tree and the fire of the eagle." 

73 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

Soon the whole force, French regulars, Canadian 
coureurs de bois (bush-rangers, or literally, run- 
ners of the woods), and Indians, took up their 
march towards Lake Champlain and reached Ti- 
conderoga by the end of July. It was a strange 
mixture of races and civilizations which gathered 
in this forest stronghold. Here were officers from 
Old France, in their white uniforms, fine gentlemen 
with the exquisite manners and speech of court 
dandies, who could bow over a lady's fan with all 
the grace in the world — and could also witness 
the butchery of wounded prisoners and the taking 
of scalps by their savage allies with an equally pleas- 
ant nonchalance. Here were the savages them- 
selves — the "Christian" Indians from the missions 
of the Penobscot, Caughnawaga, and La Presenta- 
tion on the St. Lawrence, who showed their Chris- 
tianity by an extra garment or two and by attending 
confession before going to battle. Otherwise, they 
were as ferocious as the heathen Indians from the 
West, who were there in great numbers, naked ex- 
cept for a strip of cloth, horribly painted, with 
rings of brass wire in their ears, and beads and 
feathers tied to their scalp-locks. These "made 

74 



THE TRAGEDY OF FORT WILLIAM HENRY 

medicine" before the battle, and hung up offerings 
of dead dogs or other valuable gifts to the Mani- 
tou, or Great Spirit, to ensure success. One tribe, 
the lowas, spoke a language which no interpreter 
understood. The Christian Indians were well pro- 
vided with guns. The heathens carried lances, stone 
war-clubs, or bows and arrows, with quivers made 
from the skins of beasts. All the Indians were, 
almost without exception, splendidly straight, tall, 
well-formed men. Their appetite for both meat 
and drink was enormous, and they consumed, where 
they could get them, three weeks' rations in a day. 

On the first of August the rays of the setting 
sun reddened the water of Lake George till it looked 
like blood. A great fleet was gathered there — flat- 
boats, heavy bateaux, and graceful birch canoes. 
The hour had come — and a force of seventy-six 
hundred French and Indians was on its way to at- 
tack Fort William Henry. All night they trav- 
eled. The next day they were on the shore of the 
lake but a few rods from the fort. 

Colonel Monro, a brave Scotch veteran, was in 
command of the English fort with a small force. 
When his scouts informed him that the French 

75 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

and Indians were approaching in large numbers, 
he sent a messenger post haste to Webb, at Fort 
Edward, fourteen miles away. 

Now was the time for Webb to move, before the 
fort was invested and approach to it cut off. In- 
stead, he sat down at his desk and madly scrib- 
bled a note to New England for help which could 
not possibly arrive in time. 

Putnam and the other brave soldiers at Fort 
Edward were wild to go to the rescue when they 
heard the sound of heavy firing. They waited anx- 
iously. Surely Webb would do something now to 
help his comrade in distress. 

But no command came for them to go, in spite 
of many other notes which Webb received from 
Colonel Monro. Day after day the distant can- 
nonading continued. During this time some reen- 
forcements arrived at Fort Edward — Putnam's old 
chief, Sir William Johnson, with militia from Al- 
bany and a band of his friends, the Mohawk In- 
dians, Putnam was delighted to greet his old chief. 
Surely, with this help, Webb would make some ef- 
fort to relieve Colonel Monro. 

He was soon overjoyed to hear that General 
76 



THE TRAGEDY OF FORT WILLIAM HENRY 

Johnson was to start for the Lake with a reen- 
forcement, and that he, Israel Putnam, was to ac- 
company him, at the head of his rangers. They 
quickly made ready and marched out of the gate; 
but they had hardly gone three miles before a mes- 
senger hurried after them with word from Webb 
that they were to return. Hot with rage and mor- 
tification, Putnam and the others obeyed. A year 
later, when Putnam was a prisoner in Canada, he 
was told by Montcalm himself that the intended 
movement on the part of the English had been re- 
ported to him by an Indian scout, who said, "If you 
can count the leaves on the trees you can count 
them," and that this news seriously alarmed Mont- 
calm and made him consider retreating. 

The suspense continued for two more days. On 
the evening of Monday, August 8, the watchers at 
Fort Edward saw rockets flaming and dying against 
the sky, a last signal of distress from the be- 
leaguered fort. Tuesday morning the cannonad- 
ing ceased. At ten a messenger reached the fort. 
He said that those at Fort William Henry had split 
most of their cannon, and that if reenforcements 
did not arrive they must surrender. It was too 

77 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

late even then for help. They had already sur- 
rendered. That was what the silence of the cannon 
had signified. 

Webb, in a panic for the safety of his own gar- 
rison, was on the verge of retreating. While he 
hesitated, terrible things were going on at Fort 
William Henry, The English, who had surren- 
dered under promise of good treatment, were set 
upon by the Indians, and many of them were mur- 
dered in cold blood. Others had their clothing all 
torn off, their baggage stolen, and many women 
and children were carried away. The Canadian 
officers looked on without making an effort to guard 
those they were in honor bound to protect. Mont- 
calm and some of the other French officers finally 
forced the blood-thirsty savages to stop, and sent 
the surviving prisoners under a strong guard to 
Fort Edward. Others escaped from the Indians, 
hid themselves in the thick woods, and were finally 
guided to Fort Edward by the cannon-shots those 
in the fort fired for that purpose. One after an- 
other they reached the fort, nearly naked, torn 
by briers and brambles, and half -dead from hunger 
and thirst. Putnam's heart swelled with rage and 

78 



THE TRAGEDY OF FORT WILLIAM HENRY 

pity at the sight of them. He was the first to 
reconnoiter and find that the French and Indians 
had abandoned Ticonderoga and were returning to 
Canada. With this news he calmed the fears of 
Webb and persuaded him not to retreat. 

A few days after the tragedy Putnam visited the 
site of Fort William Henry. He could not bear 
to look at what he saw. The fort had gone. In 
its place there smoldered the last of a great bon- 
fire — all that was left of the timbers of the fort 
and the bodies of the men, women and children 
who had been sacrificed to Indian rage. 



VIII 
TICONDEROGA 



VIII 
TICONDEROGA 

IF Montcalm had advanced, instead of retreat- 
ing to Canada after his victory at Fort WilHam 
Henry, he might possibly have swept the coun- 
try. Webb was all ready to abandon his forts and 
retreat to the Highlands of the Hudson. The colo- 
nies were in a panic, and greatly exaggerated re- 
ports of the numbers and ferocity of the French 
swept through them like wildfire. Luckily, the 
French commander did not follow up his victory; 
and Webb and his garrison remained undisturbed 
at Fort Edward. 

They were not greatly cheered by the arrival, in 
November, of Loudon, with reenforcements, for 
these brought the news of the utter failure of the 
English attempt to take Louisbourg on Cape Breton 
Island ; but at least their arrival meant that most 
of the New England men were released and could 
go home. 

83 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

Putnam, however, again remained on duty dur- 
ing this winter of 1757 to 1758. It was not long be- 
fore he had another opportunity to distinguish 
himself. One day, while he was working on an 
island in the Hudson near Fort Edward, he heard 
shouts from the fort and saw smoke rising from 
the barracks. The soldiers snatched buckets, and 
formed in line to pass water up from the river, but, 
in spite of their efforts, tongues of flame began 
to lick the wooden walls, and Putnam saw that it 
would be a serious conflagration. Worst of all, the 
barracks directly adjoined upon the magazine where 
gunpowder was stored! 

Putnam ran for his boat and quickly reached the 
mainland. He dashed up the slope, and took his 
stand at the head of the bucket line, on the top of 
a ladder, from which he poured water on the eaves. 
Clouds of suffocating smoke volleyed around him. 
He was so near the fire that his thick pair of wool- 
en mittens was burnt from his hands. He called 
for another pair, dipped in water, and continued 
work. 

"Putnam, come down," called Colonel Haviland, 
the commander. "You will be burned to death!" 

84 



TICONDEROGA 

"I beg you, Colonel, to let me stay," called Put- 
nam. "If I stop now, the magazine will surely be 
blown up." 

"Stay if you will," exclaimed the Colonel, "but at 
least you'll not stay alone. At it again, men! If 
we must be blown up, we will all go together." The 
men, inspired by Putnam's bravery, redoubled their 
efforts. 

The timbers of the barracks began to collapse. 
Putnam had to descend from his ladder, but kept 
on pouring water on the magazine from the ground. 
Nearer and nearer the magazine ran the greedy 
spurts of flame. Now they were at the outside 
planks — now they had eaten through these, and 
only the frail thickness of the inside planks stood 
between them and the gunpowder. 

Just at this point the bucketfuls of water passed 
by the soldiers to Putnam began to take effect. 
Slowly, slowly, the fire was beaten back. After 
an hour and a half of fighting the flames at close 
range, Putnam could leave his post. His face, 
hands, arms and body were blistered; when he 
pulled off the second pair of mittens, the skin came 
with them. The Commander could not hide his 

85 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

emotion as he thanked him. It was a month before 
Putnam recovered from his burns. 

After several more months of scouting, and vari- 
ous adventures, Putnam left in the spring of 1758 
for a brief visit to his family. When he returned 
to Albany in June he had been raised by the Con- 
necticut Assembly to the rank of Provincial Major. 
I^udon had been recalled to England, and Aber- 
crombie, a scarcely more competent officer, who 
had been put in power by political influence, had 
been raised to the rank of commander-in-chief of 
the American forces in his place. But a new light 
had come into the army in the person of Lord 
Howe, the second in rank, whom Pitt, the English 
war minister, hoped would have the real command. 

Putnam had met Lord Howe during the previ- 
ous fall, and they had become great friends. Lord 
Howe had gone camping with the rangers, shar- 
ing all their hardships, in order to learn the best 
methods of fighting and scouting in this woodland 
country. Now he was showing the soldiers how 
to fight like them. He broke all the traditions of 
the service by making officers and men throw away 
all useless baggage, cut off the heavy skirts of their 

86 



TICONDEROGA 

coats, cut their hair short, instead of wearing it 
powdered and in a ridiculous queue, wear leggings 
to protect them from briers, brown the barrels of 
their muskets, and carry in their knapsacks enough 
Indian meal to last them for several weeks. He 
went to the brook and washed his own linen, en- 
couraging his officers to do likewise. It must have 
been a hard task for some of those fat and digni- 
fied men ! He invited them to a dinner where there 
were no seats but logs, and no rugs but bearskins, 
and the only dishes were bacon and boiled peas, 
with no implements to eat them with. When his 
officers hesitated, at a loss as to the proper etiquette, 
he pulled out a sheath containing a knife and fork 
from his pocket and began to cut the meat. 

"Is it possible, gentlemen," he said, looking up 
as if just noticing his guests' embarrassment, "that 
you have come on this campaign without providing 
yourselves with what is necessary?" And he gave 
each of them a knife and fork like his own. 

In spite of his strict discipHne, all the officers 
and men adored him. A new wave of enthusiasm, 
at his presence, seemed to overrun the camps. 

Now all were preparing for an attack on Ticon- 
87 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

deroga, the French stronghold, and so confident 
were the forces that they fully expected to make 
up for the sad defeat at Fort William Henry, gain 
the fortress, and drive the French from Lake Cham- 
plain. On July 5, 1758, the army of more than 
fifteen thousand men embarked on Lake George. 
It was an inspiring sight. One of the soldiers ex- 
pressed the feelings of all when he wrote after- 
wards: "I never beheld so delightful a prospect." 
Joy must have filled Putnam's heart to be a 
Major in that gallant army, with its glittering 
weapons flashing in the sun, its bright uniforms 
(among which the plaids and kilts of the newly 
arrived Highlanders were conspicuous), its mar- 
tial music of bagpipe, fife and drum awaking the 
woodland echoes around the lake. The bateaux 
and whale-boats, rafts and heavy flatboats loaded 
with artillery were rowed with regular strokes over 
the sparkling waters, amid countless islands, be- 
tween high and wooded banks. At five in the after- 
noon they encamped at Sabbath-Day camp, but they 
took up their journey that same night, and at sun- 
rise the next morning passed under a high rock, 
called Rogers' Rock, after the famous ranger. Here, 

88 



TICONDEROGA 

unknown to them, a French advance guard, under 
the officers Langy and Trepezec, lay among the 
pines at the top, and observed their progress. They 
thought themselves too few in number to attack the 
English. 

The English landed, and formed in order for 
the march through the woods towards Ticonderoga. 
Rogers and a party of rangers led the way. The 
main army, in columns, followed. Lord Howe was 
at the head of the principal column, and Israel 
Putnam with two hundred rangers accompanied 
him. 

The army advanced with great difficulty through 
the shady forest, climbing over huge fallen logs, 
tearing themselves on the underbrush, bewildered 
by the intricacy of the woodland paths. Presently 
even the rangers and guides in front became con- 
fused, and did not know which way to turn. The 
whole army was lost in the woods. So dense was 
the canopy of green over them that only the cawing 
of crows could have signified to any watchers that 
men were marching there. 

Suddenly, when they were about two miles from 
the landing-place, a voice rang out of the thicket: 

89 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

"Qui vive?" (Who goes there?) 

"Franqais" replied the EngHsh — but the accent 
was faulty and did not deceive the critical ear of 
the challengers. They were no other than the small 
force of French under Langy and Trepezec who 
had watched the English from the top of Rogers' 
Rock. They had taken a detour, meaning to re- 
join tlieir camp at Ticonderoga and warn the French 
of the English approach — but they also, like the 
advancing army, were lost in the woods. The Eng- 
lish were now between them and the fort, and 
they were compelled to fight, though their number 
was much smaller. They rose to the occasion 
bravely. 

"Putnam," said Lord Howe, "what does that 
firing ahead mean?" 

"I don't know, but with your Lordship's leave I'll 
go and see," answered Putnam eagerly. 

"I'll come with you," said Lord Howe. 

Putnam disapproved. He was ready enough to 
risk his own life, but did not wish Lord Howe to 
do so. 

"Lord Howe," he argued, "if I am killed, the 
loss of my life will be of little consequence — but 

90 



TICONDEROGA 

the preservation of yours is of infinite importance 
to this army." 

"Nonsense ! Your life is as dear to you, Putnam, 
as mine is to me. I am determined to go," an- 
swered Howe. 

The blunt New England Major and the gallant 
young English Lord hastened to the front with a 
detachment. A hot skirmish with the attacking 
party followed. In the middle of it Lord Howe 
dropped dead, shot through the breast. With him 
died the success of the campaign. 

A panic seized the troops behind, who heard the 
firing, but saw nothing, and imagined themselves 
attacked by a much larger force than was the case. 
Putnam and his rangers, however, kept up the fight 
till the main army came to its senses. When they 
advanced, they mistook Putnam's party for the en- 
emy, and fired at them. A sergeant and several 
privates were killed, and a more serious loss was 
only avoided by Putnam's running through the fly- 
ing balls and warning them of their mistake. 

The French suffered great losses, only fifty out 
of their band escaping. The English number of 
men killed was few — but in losing Lord Howe they 

91 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

lost the soul and brains of the army. General Aber- 
crombie went all to pieces. He kept the army un- 
der arms all night without cause, and in the morn- 
ing marched them back to the landing-place. Put- 
nam was employed immediately after the battle in 
caring for the wounded, a task which his kind heart 
made him perform as thoroughly as possible. He 
gave them all the food and liquid refreshment he 
could get, and a blanket apiece. He was espe- 
cially sorry for a French officer who had been 
badly wounded, placed three blankets under him, 
and propped him up in as comfortable a position as 
possible by the side of a tree. The poor man could 
only show his gratitude by squeezing his hand. 

"Ah," said Putnam, "depend upon it, my brave 
soldier, you shall be brought to the camp as soon 
as possible, and the same care shall be taken of 
you as if you were my brother." 

What was his horror to learn the next day that 
Rogers, the ranger, who had been sent to the field 
to carry off the wounded, had killed every one of 
them who was not able to march ! 

Meanwhile Montcalm was strengthening his po- 
sition at Ticonderoga. His men worked like mad 

92 



TICONDEROGA 

all during the day, cutting down the forests around 
the fort to form a sort of zig-zag breastwork of 
felled logs, and in front of that a wide expanse 
covered with the trees as they fell, placed with tops 
out, so that the spreading branches formed an im- 
penetrable entanglement. 

It was an impossible place for infantry to at- 
tack, without the aid of cannon to shatter the log 
walls of the defense. Nevertheless, Abercrombie, 
who had heard that Montcalm expected reenforce- 
ments, hurried on his preparations, and resolved to 
attack without waiting to bring on his artillery 
wagons. Putnam and the officers were fully aware 
of the foolishness of the proceedings, but they 
remonstrated in vain. Soon after noon, July 8, 
the whole English army, rangers, light Infantry, 
armed boatmen, and all, moved forward in an at- 
tempt to storm the French breastwork. 

They reached the ground covered with fallen 
trees under a hail of bullets from the French hid- 
den behind the breastworks. Then the scene be- 
came frightful. The men were caught on the forked 
branches, and could neither go forward or back. 
"Straining," as Parkman describes it, "for an en- 

93 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

emy they could not reach, and firing on an enemy 
they could not see; caught in the entanglement of 
fallen trees; tripped by briers, stumbling over logs, 
tearing through boughs ; shouting, yelling, cursing, 
and pelted all the while with bullets that killed 
them by scores, stretched them on the ground, or 
hung them on jagged branches in strange attitudes 
of death," the poor soldiers paid with their lives for 
their commander's incompetency. Putnam as usual 
was in the thick of the fight, and acted as aid in 
bringing the provincial regiments successively to 
action. With that wonderful luck of his, he escaped 
unhurt — but the English lost in the dreadful action 
more than two thousand killed or wounded, and 
finally, after six desperate assaults, which continued 
all during the afternoon, were forced to retire at 
sunset. Major Putnam remained before the lines 
for an hour and a half longer, to cover with his 
rangers the retreat of the main body of troops, by 
keeping up a continuous fire from behind the stumps 
and bushes. 

During the night the discouraged English stum- 
bled back to their landing-place. In the morning 
Abercrombie gave up all attempt on Ticonderoga, 

94 



TICONDEROGA 

though he still had thirteen thousand men, with 
whom he might have renewed the attack with artil- 
lery. Instead, he ordered all his men to embark for 
the foot of Lake George. They set out "in great 
confusion and sorrow," and in such haste that they 
left several hundred barrels of provisions and a 
large quantity of baggage in the mud of the land- 
ing-place. This time the fifes and drums were silent 
— there were stains of blood on the bright uniforms 
— and the wounded groaned on the floors of the 
barges. So they returned in defeat to the gloomy 
site of Fort William Henry. 

After this retreat the New England soldiers gave 
Abercrombie a new name, in recognition of his old- 
womanish caution. They called him "Aunt Nabby- 
crombie" I 



IX 
CAPTIVITY 




IX 

CAPTIVITY 

^UTNAM'S thoughts were diverted from the 
harrowing battle of Ticonderoga by a thrill- 
ing experience he had not long after on the 
Hudson. He was once more employed in the rang- 
ing service. One day he was in a bateau with five 
men on the eastern shore, when his men on the 
opposite bank signaled to him that a large num- 
ber of Indians were approaching in his rear, and 
would be upon him in an instant. Below Putnam 
were rapids so dangerous that no one had ever navi- 
gated them; he had no choice but to fall into the 
hands of the Indians, expose himself to their fire 
in crossing the river, or run the rapids. He decided 
to risk the latter. He and his boatmen pushed off, 
just as the Indians arrived on the shore and fired 
on them. The current carried them rapidly beyond 
gunshot, but they were now in the greatest danger 
from the water, which swirled and boiled around 

99 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

them, in eddies and whirlpools and treacherous 
rock-slides. The rapids extended for a quarter of a 
mile. 

Putnam was at the helm. He incessantly changed 
the course to escape what seemed certain destruc- 
tion. Twice he turned the boat almost completely 
around to avoid rocks, while huge waves threat- 
ened to break over, now the sides, now the stem 
and now the bow. His comrades and the savages 
both watched him in amazement from opposite 
banks. Sometimes the boat was on the top of the 
waves, sometimes it was plunging down, and then 
it shot through narrow passages where it seemed 
that only a miracle could keep it from striking the 
rocks which were barely submerged at each side. 
But at last he gained the smooth water. Then the 
Indians pressed their hands to their mouths in their 
gesture expressing amazement. They thought he 
was under the special protection 'of the Great Spirit 
— as perhaps he was! 

But he was soon to be in worse danger. The ran- 
gers were kept especially busy during this summer 
of 1758, reconnoitering the woods and seeing that 
Montcalm's forces, which soon returned to Ticon- 

100 



CAPTIVITY 

deroga, did not surprise the timid Abercrombie at 
his camp at Fort Edward. On July 31 Rogers, 
Putnam, Captain Dalzell, and seven hundred men 
were sent to South Bay with orders to intercept a 
French war-party which Abercrombie believed had 
been hovering about Fort Edward. When they 
reached South Bay they discovered that the enemy 
had escaped them. They therefore turned about 
and began the march back to Fort Edward. They 
passed the place where Whitehall, New York, now 
stands, and encamped for the night on a fork of 
Wood Creek about a mile from the old Fort Anne. 

The next morning, Rogers, who thought the en- 
emy was nowhere near, was foolish enough to en- 
gage in a shooting contest, firing at a target with 
Lieutenant Irwin for a wager. This was against 
all scouting principles, Putnam remonstrated, but 
in vain. 

Four hundred and fifty French and Indians near- 
by, under the leadership of Marin, the famous 
woodsman, whom Putnam had fought against be- 
fore, heard the shots, and prepared to surprise the 
English by hiding in the bushes near the trail they 
judged the English would follow. 

Id 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

The English did exactly what was expected of 
them. They took up their march in the early 
evening. Their trail led past the old clearing 
around Fort Anne, which, having been neglected 
for years, was grown over with a thick under- 
brush, "almost impervious to anything but a wild- 
cat." On the narrow trail which led through this 
jungle the English marched unsuspiciously, single 
file, in the gathering dusk. Putnam headed the pro- 
cession, followed by the Connecticut men, Cap- 
tain Dalzell and his regulars were in the center, 
Rogers and his Rangers at the rear. 

Putnam was just about to leave the bushes and 
enter the forest, when a burst of yells smote his 
ears, and he saw that the thickets, which a moment 
before had been motionless, were alive with In- 
dians, leaping, crouching, and gliding like snakes. 
He snatched his gun. At that moment a tall 
Caughnawaga chief sprang at him, hatchet in hand. 
Putnam cocked his gun and snapped it at the breast 
of his adversary, but it missed fire. The Indian 
seized him and dragged him into the forest. 

Meanwhile Dalzeil struggled to the rescue, and 
Rogers, who was nearly a mile behind, heard the 

102 



CAPTIVITY 

shots and tore with his rangers at top speed through 
the bushes. When they came up, they found the 
Connecticut men fighting bravely, but at great dis- 
advantage, for the enemy were in a semi-circle 
around them, almost completely hidden in the 
bushes. The English fought desperately for two 
hours. At the end of that time the Canadians lost 
heart and many of them deserted Marin. The 
English finally succeeded in driving them all back 
into the forest. While this was going on, Putnam 
was having trials of his own. 

His position was about as bad as it could be. 
The savage who had captured him had tied him to 
a tree, and soon, when the English pressed forward, 
Putnam discovered, to his horror, that he was di- 
rectly between the two firing lines. The balls 
whistled round him — many struck the tree, and 
some passed through the sleeves and skirt of his 
coat. This lasted for more than an hour. Mean- 
while a young warrior amused himself by hurling 
a tomahawk at Putnam's head, to see how near he 
could come to him without killing him. A French 
petty officer came up and leveled a fusee within a 
foot of his breast, and tried to discharge it, but it 

103 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

missed fire. He then struck Putnam in the ribs 
with the muzzle of his gun, and gave him a cruel 
blow on the jaw with the butt-end of the piece. 

Finally, when the French and Indians began to 
retreat, Putnam's master, the chief who had cap- 
tured him, came and untied him, stripped him of 
his coat, vest, stockings and shoes, loaded him with 
as many packs of the wounded as could be piled on 
him, then pinioned him and tied his wrists tightly 
together. They took up their march over the rough 
paths of the forest. Putnam staggered under the 
heavy load, which was far beyond what any one 
man should have carried ; his feet were bleeding, 
and he suffered intolerable pain from the ropes cut- 
ting into his wrists. When they halted, after a 
march of many miles, he begged the Irish inter- 
preter to ask the savages either to knock him in the 
head and take his scalp at once, or loose his hands. 
A French officer, hearing this, ordered his hands 
unbound and some of the packs taken off. 

Just then Putnam's Indian master came up. He 
had been at the rear, in charge of the wounded. He 
expressed great indignation at the treatment his 
captive had received ; but he presently went back to 

104 



CAPTIVITY 

his wounded, and Putnam was left to the mercy of 
the other Indians, who took him on ahead to the 
place where the whole party was to encamp. 

On the way one of them wounded him with a 
tomahawk on his left cheek — the scar of which he 
bore to his dying day. It was a taste of worse treat- 
ment to follow. When the Indians reached a place 
in the forest where they thought themselves safe 
from interference, they prepared to burn him 
alive. 

They stripped him of his clothes, bound him to 
a tree, and piled dry brush in a circle around him, 
yelling meanwhile like so many fiends. Then they 
set the pile on fire. The flames disclosed a har- 
rowing scene — the hideous painted faces, feather 
headdresses and dusky bodies of the savages, 
thrown into a lurid relief against the gloomy 
shadows of the forest, and in the middle their 
white captive, writhing and struggling in vain to 
break the bands that held him. 

No sooner were the flames well started on the 
outside of the heap than a sudden shower put them 
all out. The Indians lighted them again with sparks 
from their flints. Now the twigs crackled as the 

105 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

flames ran fiercely around the circle. Putnam be- 
gan to feel the scorching heat. They had tied him 
so that he could move his body from side to side, 
as the flames approached him — and as he involun- 
tarily did so, they grinned and leaped and yelled 
in inhuman delight. 

Thoughts of his wife and children in the peace- 
ful Connecticut home flashed through Putnam's 
mind. At last he had met, in its most horrible 
form, the death that had dogged him so many times 
in his hairbreadth adventures. It was fairly upon 
him — and nevermore, he thought, would he enter 
the old gate under the apple trees, caress the chil- 
dren who came running joyfully at his hail, and 
gather his dear wife to his embrace. These thoughts 
were seared from his mind by the increasing heat. 
He commended his soul to God and prepared to 
die like a brave man ; when, suddenly, a commo- 
tion in the crowd about him reached his dulled 
ears. An officer b'-oke through the throng of sav- 
ages, kicked aside the burning brands, and unbound 
the scorched captive. It was Marin himself, who 
had been informed by an Indian of the proceed- 
ings. He upbraided the savage wretches violently, 

io6 



CAPTIVITY 

and remained on the spot till Putnam's master ar- 
rived, to whom he delivered his charge. 

The chief seemed inclined to be friendly. He of- 
fered Putnam some hard biscuit to eat, but finding 
he could not chew, on account of the blow in the 
jaw he had received from the rascally French of- 
ficer, soaked some of the biscuit in water and gave 
him the soft part to eat. He was determined, how- 
ever, that Putnam should not escape. Probably he 
had heard of his immunity in forest fighting thus 
far, and thought he needed to take special precau- 
tions. He therefore removed the moccasins from 
Putnam's feet, made him lie down on his back on 
the bare ground, stretched his arms and legs as 
far apart as possible and fastened them with ropes 
to young saplings. This method, called the "St. 
Andrew's Cross," had been used by the Indians to 
secure prisoners from time immemorial. He then 
laid saplings across his body; on the ends of which 
as many Indians as there was room for stretched 
themselves for the night, so that the slightest 
movement on the part of the captive would waken 
them. 

Putnam lay in this painful position till morning. 
107 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

In spite of the positive agony that it caused him, 
in his sore and wounded condition, he could not 
help smiling at tlie thought of how ridiculous he 
must look. 

The next morning he was given his blanket and 
moccasins, and allowed to march without carrying 
a pack. His master also gave him a little bear's 
meat to suck through his teeth. At night the party 
reached Ticonderoga. Here the captive was placed 
in charge of a French guard ; at which precaution 
the Indians made faces and gestures expressive of 
great disgust. 

Now Putnam met the famous Montcalm, and 
found him a small man, with quick, decided move- 
ments and a rapid, vehement way of speaking. 
Like Putnam, he was a lover of country life — he 
mourned much for the olives and mulberry trees 
at his home in "the pleasant land of France." He 
was a devoted husband and father, too, and wrote 
long, tender letters to his wife and mother in be- 
tween his fierce campaigns. Though he had proved 
careless — or not careful enough — at Ticonderoga, 
on other occasions he used every means in his 
power to restrain the barbarities of his Indian al- 

io8 



CAPTIVITY 

lies, "ces vilains Messieurs," "these ugly gentle- 
men," as he called them. 

He was sorry for Putnam's sad plight, and after 
a short conversation with him put him in charge of 
a French officer who he knew would protect him. 
The latter did indeed treat Putnam with kindness, 
and took the captive with him to Montreal. How 
traveled that road, mostly a water-path, was in those 
days! By day and night, winter and summer, 
French, Canadians, Indians and English captives 
passed back and forth over the waters of Lake 
George and Lake Champlain, and the Richelieu 
River to the St. Lawrence and Montreal. It was 
a background to a thousand stories as thrilling as 
that of "Old Put's." 

Among the English prisoners in Montreal at the 
time Putnam reached there was Colonel Peter 
Schuyler, a distinguished member of the distin- 
guished Albany Schuylers, a Dutch family of pa- 
troons. His rank and wealth had obtained him 
numerous favors from the French, and he was com- 
fortably lodged. He heard of Putnam's arrival 
and immediately obtained leave to visit him in the 
prisoners' quarters. What he saw shocked him. 

109 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

A forlorn, gaunt captive, with a swollen, gashed, 
and dirty face, the scantiest allowance of dirty, 
ragged clothes, his bare legs and feet bleeding from 
thorns and briers, his beard long and squalid, came 
out to him — this was a change indeed from the 
prosperous and comfortable New England officer. 

"Can this be Major Putnam?" exclaimed Schuy- 
ler. He looked closer and recognized the honest 
blue eyes of his old acquaintance, who summoned 
up a grin of welcome, ghastly enough on his swol- 
len face, but showing that the old, indomitable Put- 
nam was still there. 

*'None other," replied he hoarsely. "And mighty 
glad to see you, Colonel — though I'm not just in 
shape to receive a call — and what's more, have 
neither meat nor drink to offer you." 

"The villains — to put you in such a plight," ex- 
claimed Schuyler, careful, however, to speak in a 
low tone, lest he should endanger Putnam's chances 
still more with his captors. "Never fear, though, 
Major — I'll soon get you out of this." He left 
after a short conversation, and hurried to quarters 
where he had influence. Before long Putnam was 
moved to Schuyler's own house and supplied with 

no 



CAPTIVITY 

decent clothing and food. The generous Major 
also lent him money for his needs. 

That summer a victory for the English — ^the tak- 
ing of Fort Frontenac, at the site of Kingston on 
the St. Lawrence, by General Bradstreet and his 
armed boatmen — brought about an exchange of 
prisoners in Montreal. Schuyler was included in 
the exchange — not so Putnam. But Schuyler was 
determined to effect his release. He knew that if 
the French realized that Putnam was the partisan 
leader who had fought them so efficiently, they would 
not let him go — he therefore decided to try a ruse. 
He prevailed upon the Governor of Canada to offer 
that whatever officer Schuyler named should be 
included in the exchange list. He then remarked, 
with apparent indifference. 

"There is an old man here, who is a Provincial 
Major, and wishes to be at home with his wife and 
children ; he can do no good here or anywhere else ; 
T believe your Excellency had better keep some of 
the young men, who have no wife or children to 
care for, and let the old fellow go." This diplomacy 
had the desired effect — and the "old man," who was 
just forty, was at once released. 

Ill 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

On the journey home, Putnam was given an op- 
portunity for kindness which delighted him — for 
rough woodsman as he was, blunter in his speech 
and manners even than the majority of blunt New 
Englanders, he still possessed that real chivalry 
which springs from an honest and gentle heart. 
Knowing these qualities of his, Colonel Schuyler 
entrusted to his care during the journey a widow, 
by the name of Mrs. Howe, still beautiful and 
charming in spite of the many sorrows she had 
experienced. 

Her first husband had been killed by the Indians 
— her second also. She and her seven children had 
been taken captive by them in Hinsdale, New 
Hampshire, and led through the forests to Canada. 
There she managed to get her two eldest daughters 
into a convent in order to prevent their being mar- 
ried to Indian braves. Her other five children 
were taken from her and scattered among different 
tribes. She herself was ransomed for the sum of^^ 
four hundred livres (about eighty dollars) by an 
elderly French officer, living at Fort Jean, who took 
her to live with his family. 

The officer's son, also an officer, fell in love with 

112 



CAPTIVITY 

her. She did not return his affection, but could 
not get rid of him. Schuyler, hearing of it, came 
to the rescue, and offered to buy her from the elder 
officer, that being the only way he could obtain her 
release. The latter, thinking to turn a dishonest 
penny, would not part with her for less than one 
thousand livres. Schuyler persuaded the Governor 
to interfere and reduce the ransom to four hundred 
livres, the original amount. He also saw that every 
one of her five sons were rescued from the Indians 
and returned to her, and provided that she return 
to New England under Putnam's escort. 

When the party set out, Mrs. Howe's admirer, the 
young officer, joined them, and began again his un- 
welcome lovemaking. Mrs. Howe told Putnam, and 
Putnam informed the insolent young fellow he had 
better keep off; he had him to reckon with now 
when annoying her. Upon this, the bully beat a 
retreat. 

Major Putnam was exceedingly busy during this 
trip. He not only had to help the mother — he took 
charge of her five little boys, carrying them over 
swamps and brooks, helping them up steep places, 
even cooking and cutting up the food for the littlest 

113 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

ones. He was fairly experienced in such work, with 
all his own youngsters at home. They reached New 
England safely, Mrs. Howe finding shelter with her 
friends. Some years after, when the war was over, 
she went back to Canada to get her daughters from 
the convent. One of them had become so fond of 
convent life that she hated to leave, but finally both 
rejoined their mother. 

And what of Putnam's home-coming? Words 
fail me when I attempt to describe it. You can 
imagine it for yourself — Hannah's beaming face, 
and the glad cries of the children as they rushed to 
meet him. Then, after they had held their breaths 
and laughed and cried at the story of his trials, what 
a meal he must have sat down to. Fresh-killed 
chickens, ham and bacon, delicious vegetables from 
Hannah's garden, cooked with cream given by his 
sleek cows — with the favorite New England deli- 
cacies, pies of pumpkin and pies of apple and quince. 
Doughnuts, also, and gingerbread — just the meal to 
give anyone but a New Englander a bilious attack, 
but we may imagine Putnam was equal to it. Then, 
as the early fall evening closed in, the logs were 
lighted in the big fireplace, and neighbors dropped 

114 



CAPTIVITY 

in by twos and threes to drink hot mulled cider and 
exclaim as the hero of the hour told his tales anew. 
But there was one deep shade on this splendid home- 
coming — one place that was vacant at table and in 
the circle around the hearth. On the very day that 
Putnam had so narrowly escaped being burnt to 
death by the Indians, his second son, Daniel, a boy 
of 17, had passed away — history does not say from 
what cause. Hannah had had to bear this sorrow 
without her husband to comfort her. Truly, the 
trials of war are not all with those who go to war. 
The women who stay behind have their full share. 



X 

CANADA CONQUERED 



X 

CANADA CONQUERED 

IN following Putnam's trials during the sum- 
mer of 1758, we have overlooked the fact that 
the English campaign as a whole had taken a 
decided turn for the better. Early in the summer 
the almost impregnable fortress of Louisbourg had 
at last fallen before the gallant assault of the Eng- 
lish soldiers and sailors under Sir Jeffrey Amherst, 
helped by the officer Colonel James Wolfe, after- 
wards the hero of Quebec. In July of the same 
summer, Lieutenant-Colonel Bradstreet had taken 
Fort Frontenac on Lake Ontario ; and in November 
General Forbes and his army had taken Fort Du- 
quesne, now Pittsburg, "the Gateway of the West." 
These successes had followed the accession of 
Pitt, the great War Minister, to the command of 
military affairs in England. He put an end to all 
bungling, appointed the right men to the right 
places, and animated the whole army with courage 

119 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

and confidence. The well-planned campaigns of 
1759 were undertaken with alacrity by regulars and 
provincials alike. Their main features were the at- 
tack on Quebec by Wolfe, now a general, a new 
attempt to capture Ticonderoga and Crown Point by 
Amherst, and the advance into Canada by Amherst 
by way of Ticonderoga, Crown Point and the St. 
Lawrence. 

Putnam in the spring of 1759 received his ap- 
pointment as lieutenant-colonel in the Fourth Regi- 
ment, commanded by Colonel Fitch. Undaunted 
by his previous experiences, he set out again in 
May, 1759, on the well-traveled road to Albany. 

Again came the familiar life at the encampment 
on Lake George. This time there were about eleven 
thousand men, half regulars and half provincials. 
They busied themselves for more than a month in 
drilling, firing at targets, scouting, etc., and in such 
amusements as bathing, fishing and cutting spruce 
tops to make spruce beer, which was in much de- 
mand as a remedy for scurvy. The authorities or- 
dered that the soldiers should be provided with as 
much as they liked of this "soft drink" at a half- 
penny a quart. 

120 



CANADA CONQUERED 

The army embarked for Ticonderoga on the 
twenty-first of July, a little over a year from the 
last disastrous attempt. Again countless oars 
flashed in the sunlight, and the drums beat, as 
bateaux and barges filled with countless men in 
uniform with glittering weapons advanced along 
the picturesque lake. But this time the promise of 
the beginning was more than justified. Ticonder- 
oga was abandoned by the French almost without 
a struggle. When the English reached the intrench- 
ment at the foot of which they had suffered such 
a terrible defeat the year before, the French made 
no attempt to defend it, but took refuge inside the 
fort. They fired from there, but the English found 
shelter from the balls under the walls of the in- 
trenchment. 

Amherst now brought up his artillery to invest 
the fort. Putnam was in command of this work, 
and must have favorably contrasted Amherst's un- 
flurried preparations with Abercrombie's stupid 
haste in the last campaign. Amherst, to paraphrase 
General Grant's saying, would have sat down be- 
fore the entrenchments and fought it out with his 
artillery if it had taken all summer — but there was 

121 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

no need for such action. Bourlamaque, the French 
commander, received orders from Vaudreuil, the 
Governor of Canada, to retreat down Lake Cham- 
plain at the approach of the English. He accord- 
ingly did so, leaving only four hundred soliders 
in the fort, who escaped by night on the lake side 
in boats as the English encamped in front of it. 
As the last one stole away, Putnam and the other 
watchers saw a great glare in the night sky, fol- 
lowed by a terrific explosion, as fragments of the 
fort were hurled up into the air. The French had 
left a fire burning in the magazine. But only one 
bastion blew up, and against the lurid sky the 
French flag was seen still waving on the ramparts. 
An English sergeant of light infantry went up and 
took it off at the risk of his life. So the last sign 
of the Bourbons passed from the fort in the forest 
which had terrorized the English for so long, and 
in its place was set the red cross of St. George. 
No one dreamed how soon it too would pass, and 
the Stars and Stripes of a nation still unborn suc- 
ceed it. 

Amherst set his men to repairing the works and 
prepared to attack Crown Point, but was soon in- 

122 



CANADA CONQUERED 

formed by his scouts that that also was abandoned. 
There was nothing now to prevent his going to the 
help of Wolfe by taking his army to Oswego and 
by boat down the Lake and the St. Lawrence to 
Montreal. Wolfe, his friend and brother-in-arms, 
racking his brain with plans to capture the formi- 
dable fortress of Quebec, sorely needed his aid — ^but 
Amherst was of a deliberate disposition, and con- 
cluded he had done enough active campaigning for 
one year. He set his soldiers to building a new 
fort at Crown Point. Putnam was busy during 
the rest of the summer and autumn superintending 
this work. Meanwhile the good news reached them 
of the surrender of Fort Niagara, on July 24, 1759, 
to Sir William Johnson, who had succeeded Gen- 
eral Prideaux, killed in action. Putnam must have 
heard with a certain grim satisfaction that the 
French in the fort had been wild with terror of 
Johnson's Mohawks, fearing he would take revenge 
through them for the slaughter of defenseless Eng- 
lish prisoners at Fort William Henry. He might 
have thought that turn about was fair play, up to 
a certain point, in order that the French might real- 
ize what the English had suffered — but he antici- 

123 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

pated, of course, Johnson's action — the same that he 
would have performed in his place. Johnson so re- 
strained his fierce Mohawks that they did not in- 
flict the least injury upon the prisoners. 

During the fall a still more welcome piece of news 
reached Putnam and the others at Crown Point — 
this was the announcement of Wolfe's great victory 
— how he had led a force during the night of Sep- 
tember 12 up the steep bank which led to the 
Heights of Abraham above Quebec, how they had 
surprised the French, the battle that ensued, and 
the capture of Quebec. England and the colonies 
were wild with joy at the news, but a great sorrow 
dimmed their rejoicings — Wolfe had been killed at 
the moment of victory, murmuring, as he heard of 
the French retreat, "Now, God be praised, I can 
die in peace." Montcalm also received his death- 
blow in the battle, and was nevermore to return to 
his beloved home in France. With him died the 
hope of New France, for he was the one man of 
military genius in tlie country, and the only one who 
stood out against the political incompetency and cor- 
ruption that was choking the life from the unfor- 
tunate colony. 

124 



CANADA CONQUERED 

Of all the French possessions there now remained 
only the narrow strip on the St. Lawrence between 
Jacques-Cartier on the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and 
Kingston, on Lake Ontario. Amherst put off tak- 
ing this until the next year. The army at Crown 
Point disbanded. Putnam went home, where his 
family were more than consoled for his lack of 
thrilling tales to tell them by his safety and the 
great results of the bloodless campaign. That win- 
ter another son came to the Putnam household, and 
was called Daniel, in memory of the Daniel who 
had died during the preceding winter. 

Next spring (1760) Amherst resolved to send 
expeditions into Canada by three ways at once. 
Gen. Murray was to ascend the St. Lawrence from 
Quebec, Brigadier Haviland to enter Canada by the 
Lake Champlain route, and Amherst himself was 
to lead an army down the St. La-wrence to Mon- 
treal. Putnam was ready as usual to take part in 
the campaign, and was in charge of a part of the 
Connecticut troops in Amherst's force. For the 
fifth successive time he went to Albany in May; 
from there the forces crossed to Schenectady, then 
up the Mohawk River to Fort Stanwix on the Great 

125 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

Carrying Place, then across Oneida Lake and down 
the Onondaga River to Oswego. By the tenth of 
August the whole force was afloat on Lake Ontario. 
They progressed in three divisions, the first under 
Colonel Haldimand, the second under General Am- 
herst, the third under Brigadier-General Thomas 
Gage. Putnam was in the latter division, and be- 
came a great friend of Gage's, little knowing that 
within a few 3'ears he would be fighting against 
him. 

The fleet crossed the lake safely, and soon found 
themselves among the beautiful Thousand Islands. 
By the fifteenth of August they reached a place on 
the southwest bank of the river, at the head of 
the rapids, called La Presentation, or Oswegatchie, 
where Father Piquet, a French priest who had often 
urged his Iroquois converts on to murder the Eng- 
lish, had formerly held his mission. Outside Os- 
wegatchie (now Ogdensburg, New York) hovered 
two French armed brigs, which threatened Am- 
herst's bateaux and whaleboats. The flatboats car- 
rying his artillery had been delayed in the winding 
channels of the Islands. In this emergency Putnam 
came to the fore, according to a story printed in 

126 



CANADA CONQUERED 

Almon's "Impartial Remembrancer," an English 
volume printed in 1775: 

'"While he (Amherst) was pondering what should 
be done, Putnam comes to him and says, 'General, 
that ship must be taken.' 'Aye,' says Amherst, *I 
would give the world she was taken,' 'I'll take her,' 
says Putnam. Amherst smiled and asked how. 
'Give me some wedges, a beetle (a large wood ham- 
mer or maul, used for driving wedges), and a few 
men of my own choice.' Amherst could not con- 
ceive how an armed vessel was to be taken by four 
or five men, a beetle, and wedges. However, he 
granted Putnam's request. When night came, Put- 
nam, with his materials and men, went in a boat 
under the vessel's stern and in an instant drove in 
the wedges behind the rudder in the little cavity be- 
tween the rudder and ship and left her. In the 
morning the sails were seen fluttering about; she 
was adrift . . . and being presently blown ashore 
was easily taken." 

Humphreys, Putnam's first biographer, says that 
Putnam planned to do this, but was prevented from 
carrying out his plan, as one of the ships immedi- 
ately surrendered, and the other was run aground by 

127 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

the French. However this may be, we may give 
the New Englander credit for true Yankee ingenuity 
and resourcefulness in his scheme. 

Just below Oswegatchie was a French fort built 
on an island, and called Fort Levis. It was de- 
fended by a breastwork of heavy logs, which pro- 
jected over the water. Putnam proposed a novel 
plan for its siege. This was to send down a num- 
ber of boats surrounded by fascines, or bundles of 
sticks which should conceal the men completely, 
each boat to be provided with a long plank, fitted 
to the bow so that it could be raised or lowered at 
will. When the boats approached the breastwork, 
they were to lower the planks, in order to form a 
gangplank to the top of the works, so that the men 
could easily pass over. Whether this was actually 
done or not remains in some doubt. At any rate, 
the fort surrendered! 

After the surrender, the French were in terror 
of Johnson's Indians, who most heartily wished to 
kill the prisoners. Being restrained in this natural 
impulse, three quarters of their number went home 
in a rage. 

Just below the island on which Fort Levis stood, 
128 



CANADA CONQUERED 

begin the rapids of the St. Lawrence. The fleet 
began the dangerous descent, passed the first rapids, 
the Galops, the Rapide Plat, the Long Saut, and 
the Coteau du Lac in safety ; but when they reached 
the second stretch of rapids, which tossed their 
white crests and roared as if they longed to engulf 
the whole of Abercrombie's army, they paid a heavy 
reckoning. Forty-six boats were totally wrecked, 
eighteen damaged, and eighty-four men lost their 
lives. At last they reached the calm waters of Lake 
St. Louis, a widening of the river above Montreal, 
landed at La Chine, nine miles above the city, and 
presently marched on and encamped before the 
walls of the city itself. 

On the same day, General Murray, who had come 
up from Quebec, arrived at Isle St. Therese, just 
below Montreal, and Brigadier-General Haviland 
arrived from the Lake Champlain region. Mon- 
treal, whose defenses were useful only against In- 
dians, could not hold her own against the triple 
army of the English. On September 8, 1760, the 
city of convents and churches, priests and nuns, 
French noblesse and fur-traders — this city which 
was founded through a dream, settled by saints, 

129 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

and inhabited by sinners, which had a history of 
romance and terror second to no city on the conti- 
nent — became the possession of the alien race. At 
the same time all the other French troops in Canada 
laid down their arms. When the capitulation was 
signed, "half the continent changed hands at the 
scratch of a pen." Canada and all its dependencies 
passed to the British crown. 

What a day that was for the New England pro- 
vincials who had fought so bravely ! The long cam- 
paigning years were ended, and from Maine to Ni- 
agara the border settlers were safe forever from 
the midnight alarms of the murderous enemy. Of 
the much greater results the English conquest of 
Canada was to have for them they were still hap- 
pily ignorant. They hardly realized to what an 
extent the presence of the French on the continent 
had rendered them dependent on the mother-coun- 
try, or how the withdrawal of the enemy would 
cause them to grow in independence of spirit. But 
they had learned their lessons of courage and co- 
operation on the great forest battlefields of this war, 
and they were to put them in practice again in a 
way that they little dreamed. 

130 



XI 

THE SIEGE OF HAVANA 



XI 

THE SIEGE OF HAVANA 

OUTSIDE Montreal was an Indian mission 
called Caughnawaga, from the name of the 
tribe who lived there. Putnam, visiting 
this mission one day at the time of Montreal's 
surrender, was delighted to find an old friend, or 
so he regarded him — none other than the big Caugh- 
nawaga chief who had taken him captive near 
Ticonderoga. The chief lived in a well-built stone 
house, and was as glad to see Putnam as Putnam 
was to see him. They shook hands, smoked a pipe 
of peace together, and Putnam promised to protect 
the Indian now that he had come under the power 
of the English. Remembering the hospitality the 
chief had shown Putnam in stripping him of most 
of his clothes, tying him to a tree in the thick of 
the battle, and binding him down in a St. Andrew's 
cross all night, this certainly showed a magnani- 
mous spirit on the part of our hero. But Putnam 

133 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

was a true soldier, and understood the conditions 
of warfare too well to harbor resentment at a little 
rough treatment. "The Caughnawagas are the 
bravest of Indians," he was accustomed to declare, 
and wished to make them our allies at the time of 
the Revolution. 

Within a week after the capitulation, Putnam, 
with the rest of the Connecticut men, was on his 
way back to Lake Champlain, where they worked 
on Fort William Augustus till the last of October, 
when he returned to his home. 

He must have been almost ready to settle down, 
but the next year, 1761, Amherst called the forces 
out again in a campaign for the purpose of reducing 
"the enemy to the necessity of accepting a peace, 
on terms of Glory and advantage to his Majesty's 
Crown, and beneficial, in particular, to his subjects 
in America." Putnam was lieutenant-colonel of 
the Second Connecticut Regiment. This year there 
was no fighting and he was employed in superin- 
tending the rebuilding and strengthening of the 
forts at Ticonderoga and Crown Point. 

But though Canada was conquered, England was 
not yet at peace. An arrangement called the "Fam- 

134 



THE SIEGE OF HAVANA * 

ily Compact" had been made between the Bourbon 
rulers of France and Spain (Charles III of Spain 
and Louis XV of France), which threatened the 
interests of England. She accordingly declared war 
on Spain, on the 4th of January, 1762. The cap- 
ture of the West Indian Islands belonging to Spain 
was the first thing on her program. During Febru- 
ary of that year Martinique was captured by the 
British; and in the early spring the Earl of Albe- 
marle and Admiral Sir John Pococke sailed to cap- 
ture Havana. 

Meanwhile the British government had called 
upon the colonies to furnish troops, and Connecti- 
cut had voted to furnish twenty-three hundred men. 
Lyman, always the leader of the Connecticut forces 
in this period, was again in command, and second 
to him was Putnam, now lieutenant-colonel of the 
First Regiment. 

Putnam, though he must have had some gray 
hairs by now, was something of a boy still in his 
zest for adventure. To exchange the snows and bit- 
ing blasts of Canada, and the hard woodland life of 
Ticonderoga, for the soft airs, the palms and co- 
conut trees, and the sandy beaches of Cuba appealed 

135 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

to him. But, aside from that, he was ready to go, 
as ahvays, where his country needed him. It must 
have been a rehef, though, that instead of assem- 
bling at the little frontier village of Albany, as they 
had in so many wearisome years gone by, the forces 
met at New York, then as now a city of great at- 
tractions, though there were no skyscrapers to gaze 
at, no great crowds or bustle. Perhaps at the time 
Putnam paid it this visit there was a play going 
on in the theater, built in 1753, when "play-acting" 
in Boston was still severely punished by the Puri- 
tan authorities. He may have seen "The Beaux' 
Stratagem," perhaps, or "The Beggar's Opera," or 
"Richard the Third." And if he did, it was prob- 
ably the first play he ever saw in all his life. But 
there was not much time for him to divert himself 
in the city, for he was now acting Colonel of the 
Connecticut regiment. General Lyman being in com- 
mand of the brigade, and there were many things 
to be attended to before the sailing of the army. 
The transports finally got off in June. 

The first part of their voyage was uneventful; 
but as the fleet approached the coast of Cuba, it en- 
countered a terrific storm, and the transport which 

136 



THE SIEGE OF HAVANA 

carried Putnam and five hundred of his men was 
driven upon the rocks and wrecked. 

Putnam kept his head in the midst of the fury of 
the tempest, the pounding of the ship on the rocks 
and the noise of the waves, and shouted directions 
to his soldiers. He kept strict order, and set those 
who understood tools to making rafts out of spars, 
planks, etc. They launched one of these, and by 
the aid of long cables of rope they had on board, 
stretched a line from the ship to the shore, which 
was of great help in getting the other rafts to land. 
All the men reached the shore safely. Putnam had 
them make a camp and fortify it in order that they 
might not be taken by surprise if inhabitants of 
this or neighboring islands attacked them. No such 
attack occurred, and after their being in camp two 
or three days the storm subsided, and the rest of 
the fleet, which had ridden out the storm with great 
difficulty, sent a convoy to shore to take them away. 
The journey was resumed, and they were shortly 
in sight of the deep, narrow entrance of Havana 
Harbor, and the gray outlines of Morro Castle on 
the left. 

The English soldiers, eleven thousand in number, 
137 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

under the Earl of Albemarle, had been toiling here 
for nearly two months, digging trenches in the dry 
earth, at the foot of the castle, under the pitiless 
midsummer sun of the Tropics. The earth was so 
scarce they hardly had enough to keep the fascines 
in place, and the siege works were only a mass of 
dry fagots. When the grand battery opened upon 
the Spanish defenses, the battery itself took fire, 
burned up and had to be built all over again. The 
soldiers fell sick ; fresh water was scarce, and many 
died from thirst, others from fevers. It was a dis- 
mal scene that the New England soldiers entered 
upon, but their fresh strength and contagious good 
spirits seemed to reanimate the whole army. 

With the help of the provincial reenforcements. 
Lord Albemarle determined to attempt to carry 
Morro Castle, the key to Havana, as it was called, 
by storm. The work of sapping, that is, undermin- 
ing by tunnels, had resulted in a breach of the right 
bastion of the fort, on the thirtieth of July. On the 
afternoon of that day, the English storming-party 
mounted the breach, overtook the defenders by sur- 
prise, and dispersed them. The Commandant of 
the fort, Don Luis de Velasco, a very brave Span- 

138 



THE SIEGE OF HAVANA 

iard, refused to fly, and was mortally wounded in 
the fight. So honorable was his conduct that the 
Spanish authorities ordered that ever after there 
should be a ship in the Spanish navy named Velasco. 
In the work of storming the fortress, the Spaniards 
lost about five hundred men, while the English lost 
only two officers and thirty men. "There is," says 
William Farrand Livingston, one of Putnam's biog- 
raphers, "no detailed record of Putnam's part in the 
victorious action, but he was a sharer in the honors 
bestowed upon the members of the storming party 
for their gallant service," 

The next object of Lord Albemarle was the fall 
of Havana. Works were begun upon both sides of 
the city, and carried on for ten days. On the morn- 
ing of August II, the English batteries opened fire; 
the bombardment continued till two in the after- 
noon, when the Spanish offered to surrender. Two 
days later the negotiations ended and Havana and 
its immediate territory was in the hands of the 
English. It was the second great city Putnam had 
seen pass to the English arms within a year, and 
he joined in the triumph as the olive-skinned 
Spaniards, nearly a thousand regular troops, 

139 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

marched out of the city with all the honors of 
war. When he entered, with the English, he gazed 
about him with delight at the picturesque, balco- 
nied houses which the shells had spared, covered 
with plaster, white or tinted in vivid, yet soft, blues 
and greens and rose and lavenders and yellows, 
at the courtyards guarded by handsome wrought- 
iron gates, at the graceful palm trees and pleasant 
parks, or plazas, where the military band was wont 
to play every afternoon, and those of the Spanish 
aristocracy who had not left the city drove or 
strolled. There must have been much for the New 
Englanders to see in the quaint Spanish town; but 
the sight-seeing was not done under as pleasant 
conditions as it would be now, for the Northerners 
had not learned how to guard their health in the 
Tropics, and the New England troops, as well as 
the English, caught more fevers, till the camps were 
full of sick and dying men. Putnam had such 
a strong constitution that nothing seemed to af- 
fect him. One day he and Lieutenant Parks went 
out in the country near Havana to buy provisions 
for the troops, exposing themselves in the process 
to the noonday sun, which is very dangerous in 

140 



THE SIEGE OF HAVANA 

the Tropics. By the time they returned, the Lieu- 
tenant was ill, and a few days later he died, but 
Putnam felt no bad effects. 

One day, while Putnam was strolling along the 
streets of Havana, he came upon a Spaniard beat- 
ing a negro slave unmercifully with his bamboo 
cane. You remember Putnam's first adventure with 
a negro slave — his kind heart had not changed a 
particle since then. Although he was unarmed and 
alone, he walked up to the Spaniard and wrested 
the cane from his hands. A mob of Cubans gath- 
ered, and threatened to give Putnam a beating. He 
ducked through them and ran for his life to the 
wharf, where an English ship lay. When he 
reached there he found that the negro had fol- 
lowed and absolutely refused to leave him. Put- 
nam took him home with him when he left, and 
found "Dick," as he was called, the most faithful 
of servants. When Putnam died, he left Dick 
the bamboo cane, and the old negro hobbled around 
on it proudly all the rest of his life. 

The days dragged on. Soon it was fall, and 
the men, reduced in numbers and depressed in 
spirits by constant deaths, longed for home. At 

141 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

last, in October, the welcome order came to em- 
bark. The Connecticut soldiers could hardly wait 
to get on the ships, eager as they were to "reach 
their native Shores and with wraptured hearts over- 
come with Joy, to Salute, embrace, and fall into 
the Arms of their long wished for, wishing, lovely, 
loving friends," as a Chaplain, whose pen fairly stut- 
tered with excitement, wrote in his diary. Their 
longing had been increased by a ship that came 
to Havana in October, and brought them news of 
a prosperous season and good harvests in New Eng- 
land. I imagine they would have exchanged all 
the tropical delicacies in the world for one ear 
of corn from a New England garden when they 
heard that. At last the transports sailed out of 
Havana harbor — and Putnam had one more nar- 
row escape, as his ship struck a rock, but it was 
finally carried off by the wind. It was a rough 
passage, and many were seasick, and many of the 
fever sufferers died. But they reached New York 
finally, and there scattered for home. 

The capture of Havana had produced a sensa- 
tion in the American colonies, and Putnam, with 
others who had taken part in it, was received with 

142 



THE SIEGE OF HAVANA 

great honors upon his return. What was their 
surprise to learn, a few months after, that this great 
fortress and commanding point in the West In- 
dies they had helped gain was to be given back 
to Spain in return for the comparatively unim- 
portant region of Florida. In July, 1763, Havana 
was returned to Spain and the English soldiers 
walked out of the city. That surrender had more 
important consequences than were seen at the time. 
If the Americans had not been able to use Havana 
as a port during the Revolution, the struggle with 
England would have been considerably harder than 
it was, and might have ended very differently. 



XII 
PONTIAC'S REBELLION 



XII 

PONTIACS REBELLION 

IF this were a "made-up" story of adventure, 
I should really be ashamed to have the hero 
go through so many excitements in such dif- 
ferent parts of the country in such a short period 
of time; I should feel as if it were taxing the im- 
agination of the reader too much. But as this 
story of Putnam's life is absolutely true, I shall 
have to tell just what happened, and leave the 
reader to judge whether life in the good old days 
before automobiles and flying-machines was quite 
as peaceful as we usually imagine. 

Putnam had hardly returned from his Cuban 
trip before he was sent in an entirely diflferent di- 
rection to help quell a great Indian uprising — the 
greatest that had ever taken place in North Amer- 
ica since the white man came there. 

"This Assembly doth appoint Israel Putnam, 
Esq., to be Major of the forces now ordered to 

147 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

be raised in this colony for his Majesty's service 
against the Indian nations who have been guilty 
of perfidious and cruel massacres of the English." 
So read Putnam's commission from the Connecti- 
cut Assembly in the spring of 1764. The Indians 
of the Great Lakes and Ohio Valley had been 
disgusted at the outcome of the French and Indian 
War. They hated and distrusted the English — and 
no wonder; for, while the French officers feasted 
and flattered them, and gave them many presents, 
and the French traders lived in their village witK 
them on almost equal terms, and took Indian women 
for wives, the English pursued an entirely differ- 
ent policy. They were rude and contemptuous in 
their manners, refused to give them presents, made 
fun of their wampum belts and other sacred em- 
blems, would not have the savages about their 
camps, and cheated them right and left in trade. 
Besides all this, the Indians realized that, while 
the French came to their country mainly to get 
furs, the English meant to settle, and eventually 
drive them out of their lands. 

Greatest among all Indians at that time — and, in- 
deed, one of the greatest of Indians at any time 

148 



PONTIAC'S REBELLION 

— was an Ottawa chief called Pontiac, who lived 
in the western Great Lake region. He conceived 
the plan of uniting all the Indian tribes between 
the Allegheny Mountains and the Mississippi 
River in a systematic effort to drive out the Eng- 
lish from that region. In the autumn of 1762 he 
sent his messengers far and wide, with many wam- 
pum belts, and tomahawks stained red in token of 
war, pledging all the tribes to action in the fol- 
lowing spring. His plan was for a great simul- 
taneous attack on the English forts along the Great 
Lakes. The Indians in the neighborhood of these 
forts were to gain admission to them under vari- 
ous pretexts — and once in they were to massacre 
all the inhabitants. 

These plans were carried out only too well. 
Mackinac, Presqu'isle (Erie), Sandusky and all 
the other isolated posts but one on the Great Lakes 
fell before the Indians' attacks in May, 1763. De- 
troit alone held out. Major Gladwyn, the com- 
mander (with whom Putnam had fought at Crown 
Point), received word through an Indian girl of 
the intended attack in time to prepare for it. He 
closed the gates of the fortified town at Detroit, 

149 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

and for months he and his soldiers withstood a 
siege carried on by the Indians under the direction 
of Pontiac himself. It was the only example of 
such a siege in all Indian history. 

When the siege first began, in May, 1763, Am- 
herst had been the commander-in-chief in America. 
He had a very poor opinion of Indians, so much 
so that he thought their attacks hardly worth both- 
ering about! So he left those at Detroit to de- 
fend themselves as best they might. In 1764 Gen- 
eral Thomas Gage (whose acquaintance Putnam 
had made during the Montreal campaign) suc- 
ceeded Amherst; and he resolved to send two ex- 
peditions into the Indian country; one, under 
Colonel Bouquet, to advance west from Port Pitt 
(Pittsburg) to subdue the Delawares and Shawa- 
noes of that region, and the other, under Brad- 
street, down the Great Lakes to relieve Detroit. 
The latter was the expedition which Putnam 
joined. 

Putnam went to Albany, where Bradstreet's army 
was collecting. The forces went up the Mohawk 
River, crossed Oneida Lake, descended the Onon- 
daga, and, reaching Oswego, embarked on Lake On- 

150 



PONTIAC'S REBELLION 

tario. After a few days' journey on the Lake they 
reached Niagara. Here were the bark wigwams of 
a great number of friendly Indians, who had been 
persuaded to come by the influence of Sir William 
Johnson. Among them Putnam's Caughnawaga 
chief turned up again. After making a treaty of 
friendship with the English, many of the Indians 
wandered away to their western hunting grounds; 
but the Caughnawaga, at the head of a hundred of 
his tribe, accompanied the army westward, and won 
special praise for good behavior. 

The English army after a while reached a point 
on the Lake between the present cities of Buffalo 
and Erie, where they found more Indians waiting 
to speak with them. These were Delawares and 
Shawanoes from the Ohio Valley. They had come 
to make a treaty, they said ; but they only had one 
wampum belt. 

"Don't trust them. General," Putnam warned 
Bradstreet. "Indians who are sent by their tribes 
to make treaties always have much wampum, a 
belt for every clause of the treaty. These fellows 
are deceiving us. Like as not, they want to de- 
tain us while their friends massacre more English 

151 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

settlers west and south of us." Bradstreet thought 
he knew more about Indians than anyone else, and 
paid no attention to Putnam's advice, which the 
other officers who were familiar with Indians sec- 
onded. He found out his mistake later on, when 
the treaty which he made with them was not kept, 
and the unfortunate officers he dispatched to their 
villages were illtreated and nearly killed. The same 
thing happened at Sandusky, where Bradstreet had 
been ordered to punish the Indians for their horri- 
ble massacre of the Sandusky garrison, but made 
a treaty instead. All this took much time, and it 
was the twenty-sixth of August before the Amer- 
ican forces came in sight of the stockaded town of 
Detroit. 

Along the banks of the river were Indian vil- 
lages, but not an Englishman was in sight. They 
were huddled inside the stockade, as they had been 
almost continuously for fifteen long and dreary 
months. During most of that time a soldier could 
not lift his cap above the ramparts without having 
it shot away by some savage skulking in the grass 
outside. They had suffered from scarcity of food 
and of clothing — they had heard of nothing but 

152 



PONTIAC'S REBELLION 

massacres of the other garrisons along the Lakes, 
Worse still, they were in continual terror for fear 
the Indians would set the town on fire with their 
burning arrows, or cut and bum their way through 
the wooden palisades. Luckily, such an assault was 
against all the Indian ideas of warfare, and did 
not occur. 

When those in the fort saw the fleet approach- 
ing, their excitement was intense. For the first 
time the gaunt and ragged soldiers dared to crowd 
upon the ramparts. They cheered, they waved, and 
the cannon in the blockhouse roared a welcome. 
Hostile Indians scuttled away, and friendly ones, 
who had sent ambassadors to Niagara, flocked to 
the shores in welcome. 

Bradstreet's army landed and poured into the 
fort. It was an invasion at last, but a friendly one. 
Comrades who had served together in the last war 
greeted each other. Putnam lost no time in shaking 
hands with the gallant commander, Major Glad- 
wyn, with whom he had served at Ticonderoga 
and Crown Point. He heard with regret that 
Dalzell, who was with Putnam's party when he 
was captured by the Indians, had led a sortie 

153 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

from the fort and been killed by the Indians 
while trying to lift a wounded soldier to a place 
of safety. 

But now all sorrows were forgotten in relief 
at the end of the long siege. Fresh men from 
Bradstreet's forces took the place of the troops who 
had watched so long. Pontiac, the main spirit of 
the attacking Indians, was away in the Maumee 
region, and his followers, convinced now that the 
English were too strong for them, begged for 
peace. They promised to call themselves the "chil- 
dren" of the King of England. They meant It 
merely as a graceful compliment, but Bradstreet 
thought they had promised to be subjects, and 
would obey the English King henceforth and never 
fight against him. He did not understand the 
Indian nature, as was shown most plainly by his 
hacking to pieces with his sword a belt of wampum 
the Indians offered to clinch the treaty. He could 
hardly have insulted them worse if he had killed 
one of their number. However, the Indians passed 
over the insult in silence. 

Presently the army took up its way homeward. 
They stopped at Sandusky nearly a month, during 

154 



PONTIAC'S REBELLION 

which time Putnam, at the head of the provincials, 
superintended the rebuilding of the fort. He was 
much impressed by the fertile, level country, where, 
as he wrote to a friend at home, "there are ten 
or twenty thousand acres of land in a place that 
have not a bush or twig on them, but all covered 
with grass so big and high that it is very difificult 
to travel — and all as good plow-land as ever you 
saw ; any of it fit for hemp ; but there are too many 
hemp birds among it, which will make it very un- 
healthy to live among. Detroit is a very beautiful 
place, and the country around it." 

He was less impressed with the conduct of the 
Indians, supposedly now friends and allies of the 
English. "The Six Nations are all angry," he 
writes, "and this day they are all packing up to 
go off ; and what will be the event I ^on't know nor 
care, for I have no faith in an Indian peace patched 
up by presents." 

However, the Indians offered no serious trouble. 
The chief difficulty the army encountered on the 
way home was the weather. Soon after leaving 
Sandusky, Bradstreet insisted upon the fleet's en- 
camping on an open beach, exposed to the wind, 

155 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

though there was a river near which would have 
held them in safety. During the night a storm 
arose, which dashed half their boats to pieces, and 
caused the destruction of much food and other sup- 
plies. When the storm subsided and they were 
ready to go on, there were not enough boats left 
to hold them. Some had to travel by land; while 
those on the vessels, of whom Putnam was one, 
were crowded so that they suffered greatly. There 
was not enough food, and they were almost starved 
by the time they reached Fort Niagara, where fresh 
oxen were killed for them. When they left Niagara 
and set sail on Lake Ontario, they met with a "per- 
fect Tempest with a snow drift, the wind being 
chiefly N.W. and extremely cold." 

Putnam, with his usual hardihood, was one of 
those the least affected by the trip, and upon reach- 
ing Oswego, where many stayed to recover, 
marched on to the Hudson. There the regulars 
went into winter quarters and the provincials dis- 
banded. Putnam, needless to say, went home. 

The war-chief, Pontiac, though he continued to 
make trouble for a year or more afterward, finally 
bowed to the inevitable and made his peace with 

IS6 



PONTIAC'S REBELLION 

the English. Putnam hung his flintlock and his 
carved powder-horn up to take a well-deserved rest. 
It was almost ten years before they were needed 
again. 



XIII 
A HERO AT HOME 



XIII 

A HERO AT HOME 

ONE of the surest signs of being a hero is 
receiving a nickname from the people. 
When Israel Putnam came home from the 
French and Indian Wars he was no longer Israel 
Putnam — he was "Old Put" on the lips of all New 
England. There was probably no man in his part 
of the world better known or more admired than 
he. The stories returned soldiers told of "Old 
Put's" dashing deeds and narrow escapes were fa- 
vorite ones at the home fireside; and Putnam's 
democratic principles and manners and his kind 
heart won him an affection which mere cour- 
age might not have gained. I dare say the com- 
mon people liked him all the better because he 
had little book-learning and culture; he was one 
of themselves, a man who had risen in the world 
by his own spirit and courage and hard work ; and 
so they took him to their hearts and made much 
of him. 

i6i 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

"Old Put" was not too much of a hero to settle 
down to farming and a quiet life again. He took up 
the plow with as much zest as if he had never seen 
a gun, and made many improvements on his farm. 
He enjoyed being at home and with his family, but, 
alas, two great sorrows were in store for him. The 
first was the death of his eldest daughter, Eliza- 
beth, aged seventeen, in January, 1765; the second, 
but a few months later, the death of his dear wife, 
Hannah, his brave and steadfast helpmate during 
so many years. The youngest baby of all, named 
Peter Schuyler, after his father's benefactor at 
Montreal, was only a few months old. 

Soon after his wife's death, Putnam showed 
his increased attention to serious things by becom- 
ing a full member of the Congregational Church in 
his neighborhood. 

These were the years when the Colonies were 
beginning to seethe with excitement over the pass- 
ing of the detested Stamp Act. You may be sure 
that "Old Put," in spite of having been so long 
in his Majesty's service, and having so many friends 
among the English officers, was among the first to 
resent British injustice to the rights of a liberty- 

162 



A HERO AT HOME 

loving people. He had joined the patriotic society, 
"The Sons of Liberty" before the passing of the 
Stamp Act. The day he heard the Act was ac- 
tually passed, he got his horse, saddled it, and set 
out to ride from one town to another over the 
eastern part of Connecticut to find out how many 
men could be counted upon to offer armed resist- 
ance to the Act. 

The British officers in New York heard of his 
activities and were much incensed. Ten thousand 
men, they heard, in Connecticut alone were ready 
to resist the Stamp Act under the command of 
Colonel Putnam. 

Putnam sent messages to the Sons of Liberty in 
Massachusetts, New York and other colonies that 
he "would assist them with the Militia to the ut- 
most lives and fortunes to prevent the Stamp Act 
being enforced." 

Unfortunately, an accident prevented his being 
present when the Connecticut men met Jared In- 
gersoll, the appointed Stamp Officer, near Hartford, 
Connecticut, on his way to fulfill the duties of his. 
office, and made him mount a table, deliver a speech 
resigning his office, and shout three times, "Liberty 

163 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

and Property!" Putnam would have laughed in 
spite of himself when the Stamp Officer remarked 
ruefully, as he rode along on his white horse be- 
fore that great crowd of incensed patriots, "This 
reminds me of that passage in the Book of Reve- 
lation which describes, 'Death on a pale horse and 
hell following him.' " 

The feeling against the starrtps was so strong in 
Connecticut that the agents did not dare send the 
stamps there. They had heard of the conversa- 
tion Putnam had had with Governor Fitch a little 
later. Putnam and two other men had been dele- 
gated to call on the Governor and gently but firmly 
acquaint him with their views. The Governor 
asked, "What shall I do if the stamped paper should 
be sent to me by the King's authority?" 

"Lock it up," replied Putnam boldly, "till we [he 
meant the Sons of Liberty] shall visit you again." 

"And what will you do then?" asked the Gov- 
ernor. 

"We shall expect you to give us the key of the 
room in which it is deposited; and, if you think fit, 
in order to screen yourself from blame, you may 
forewarn us upon our peril not to enter the room." 

164 



A HERO AT HOME 

**And what will you do afterwards?" 

"Send it safely back again." 

"But what if I should refuse admission?" 

"In such case your house will be leveled with the 
dust in five minutes!" 

He meant it, and the Governor knew he did; so 
no stamps were sent to Connecticut. 

The next year, 1766, Putnam was one of the two 
chosen by the Windham County Committee to cor- 
respond with members of the organization in the 
other colonies, in order to keep up opposition to 
the Stamp Act. He was elected one of their two 
representatives to the Colonial Legislature in that 
year, and was in Hartford and shared in the great 
jubilations that ensued when the news came that 
the Stamp Act had been repealed by the King and 
Parliament. 

After the legislature had adjourned, which was 
in the early summer, Putnam, who had gone back 
to his farm, met with a serious accident; he frac- 
tured his right thigh, which caused him to limp all 
the rest of his life. In spite of this, he attended 
the fall and winter sessions of the Legislature at 
New- Haven and Hartford. 

165 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

In the meantime the widower was beginning 
to "take notice," and the cause of this "noticing" 
was an attractive widow, Mrs. Deborah Lothrop 
Gardiner. In those days second and even third 
marriages were very common, for, as we have seen, 
it was not considered good for either man or woman 
to live alone. Putnam married Mrs. Gardiner on 
June 3, 1767. She had one grown-up son who was 
a clergyman, and also a young son and daughter, 
Hannah and Septimus Gardiner, nine and seven 
respectively. Putnam's son Israel was now twen- 
ty-seven, married and carrying on his father's 
farm, his eldest daughter Hannah was married 
and had a home of her own. The next three 
Putnam children, Mehitable, Mary and Eunice, di- 
vided their time between their brother Israel's and 
their father's house, after his second marriage, 
while the two youngest, Daniel and little Peter, 
Uved with Israel and their stepmother and the 
new little stepbrother and sister. 

Mrs. Putnam was a good and charming woman, 
with more social graces, perhaps, than her rough 
and ready soldier husband. She brought many in- 
fluential new connections, of those who were con- 

166 



A HERO AT HOME 

sidered the Connecticut aristocracy, into the fam- 
ily circle, and these, with Putnam's already large 
host of friends, kept the newly-wed pair busy en- 
tertaining. 

Everybody came — old soldiers, "relatives, friends, 
traveling ministers, distinguished strangers, and 
gushing patriots." Even in those days of low cost 
of living, so many visitors could not help but be 
an expensive luxury to the host. Putnam did not 
wish to turn them away — but he did not wish to 
be ruined, either. Suddenly he had a brilliant idea. 
Why not turn his house into an inn? No sooner 
thought of than done. He suddenly removed his 
residence to a large mansion on Brooklyn Green 
and opened it to the public. 

In those days all inns had gay, hand-painted 
wooden sign-boards hung in front of them to at- 
tract the attention of travelers. Before Putnam's 
hung a picture of General Wolfe, the hero of Louis- 
bourg and Quebec, in full uniform, In a fiery at- 
titude, as if charging at the foe. At the outbreak 
of the Revolution the sign had to come down. Eng- 
lish military heroes were not popular then. Per- 
haps that is the period when the sign was sprinkled 

167 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

with shot holes, which you may see in it today in 
the rooms of the Connecticut Historical Society at 
Hartford. 

Putnam was just the right person for an inn- 
keeper of that period. "The landlord of colonial 
days," says Alice Morse Earle, in her interesting 
book, "Stage Coach and Tavern Days," "was cer- 
tainly the best known, often the most popular, and 
ever the most picturesque and cheerful figure." He 
had to be a man of high character, or he could 
not get a license from the stern New England au- 
thorities. He was often, like Putnam, a retired 
provincial officer. 

The genial Colonel Putnam was in his element, 
then, in his new profession. He knew how to of- 
fer comfortable entertainment to "man and beast" ; 
and when the guests were gathered about his roar- 
ing big fire, he entertained them with shrewd com- 
ment on current affairs, or with stirring tales of 
the late war-time. His new occupation gave Put- 
nam also a chance to keep in closest touch with 
what was going on in the world, for in those days, 
when newspapers were scarce and news traveled 
from mouth to mouth, the latest was always to be 

i68 



A HERO AT HOME 

had at the inn, where strangers came and towns- 
people met to conduct their local business. Put- 
nam by this means knew all the varying degrees 
of sentiment in the colony in these troubled times; 
and in his own outspoken and wholehearted way 
did a great deal to influence public opinion toward 
the patriot side. 

To count up the honors which "Old Put" re- 
ceived during this comparatively restful period of 
his career: he was Selectman, an office given only 
to persons of "wisdom and uprightness," Modera- 
tor of the Town Meeting, served on committees to 
rebuild "Danielson's Bridge," lay out new roads, 
rearrange school districts, engage schoolmasters, 
collect taxes, etc. ; he was put in charge of the build- 
ing of the new meeting-house; he was made bell- 
ringer of the meeting-house, a very important of- 
fice, only given to persons of the utmost trust- 
worthiness ; and, added to all these, was still an- 
other office carrying something of distinction which 
perhaps we cannot quite appreciate nowadays — he 
was made "receiver of crow's heads" — or the person 
who counted and paid a bounty of sixpence on each 
crow's head (or two pence on each young crow's 

169 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

head) to those who killed these mischievous ene- 
mies of the farmers! 

At the end of five or six years of this peaceful, 
but busy life, the Colonel set out for a new corner 
of the globe. Business called him this time; he 
was to claim a grant of land which he was told 
had been extended to him in the far South. 



XIV 

"THE COMPANY OF MILITARY 
ADVENTURERS" 



XIV 

"THE COMPANY OF MILITARY ADVENTURERS" 

THE Company of Military Adventurers" — 
hasn't that a romantic and swash-buckling 
sound? So thought Daniel Putnam, Is- 
rael's thirteen-year-old son. He could hardly be- 
lieve in his good fortune when his father told him, 
one winter morning, that he, Daniel, was actually 
to accompany him on a trip South as unofficial 
member of the "Exploring Committee" of the said 
company. 

"Oh, Jiminy!" cried Daniel. "Maybe I'll have a 
chance to shoot a real alligator!" 

"I shouldn't wonder," replied his father ; "we are 
going up to the Mississippi River, where there will 
be plenty of them." 

It seemed that Putnam's old general, Phineas Ly- 
man, was leading an expedition of former soldiers 
and officers to the Mississippi Valley, expecting to 
obtain for them a grant of lands in this region in 

173 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

return for their valiant services to the British Gov- 
ernment. General Lyman had been in England for 
the past ten years trying to obtain this grant. The 
English court, according to the pleasing habit of 
courts, had kept him dangling and disappointed for 
years, but at last, in 1772, he thought he had at- 
tained his object, and returned to America. Here 
he formed the company with the romantic name. 
Daniel, his father, and cousin. Lieutenant Rufus 
Putnam, made the trip to New York on horseback 
as far as Norwich, and from there in a sloop down 
the Sound and up the East River to New York. 
They had an exciting passage through Hell Gate, 
where their sloop was nearly wrecked on account 
of a bad pilot. Daniel was wild with excitement, 
which he tried his best not to show, when the sloop 
finally touched at the dock and they landed and 
made their way over the cobbled streets of the 
town. He had never seen so many buildings be- 
fore, and such handsome ones, of red and black 
Dutch bricks, with stately high stoops. It was 
Sunday, and as they crossed Broadway the peo- 
ple were returning from church. After dinner, at 
the modest tavern where they put up, the Putnams 

174 



"COMPANY OF MILITARY ADVENTURERS" 

went to church also, the Brick Presbyterian, where 
they heard Dr. John Rodgers, a noted divine. This 
was the largest church Daniel had ever been in, and 
he found plenty to interest him in its construction 
and the looks and manners of the congregation, 
even if the good Doctor's sermon was somewhat 
over his head. 

Early the next morning he begged his father or 
his cousin to take him sightseeing. Though New 
York then extended over only an infinitesimal part 
of its present area, there was much for him to 
gaze at — the fort and Battery, the Mall near Trin- 
ity Church where the fine ladies walked in the after- 
noons, and King's College, where boys his own age 
were studying. But more interesting than all were 
the docks, smelling of tar, oakum, molasses and raw 
sugar, with spicy smells of cargoes from still far- 
ther lands, the gallant sloops with their tall masts, 
and the bronzed tattooed sailors, with gold or brass 
rings in their ears. As his father was busy much 
of the time superintending the preparation of the 
vessel on which they were to sail, Daniel had plenty 
of opportunity to wander about these fascinating 
docks. 

175 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

On December 25, a day which in Daniel's part 
of the world had never been marked by any spe- 
cial celebration, he was surprised to find the New 
Yorkers suspending business just as if it were Sun- 
day. The Putnams had few New York acquaint- 
ances, so Daniel did not guess at the merry doings 
inside the houses which marked the Dutch and Eng- 
lish observation of Christmas and New Year's — the 
presents — the burning of the Yule log — the plum 
puddings all on fire — the wassail bowls — and the 
merry dances in which old and young joined. If 
he had, I am afraid the heart of that thirteen-year- 
old boy would have been envious in spite of his 
Puritan bringing-up! 

The next day, too, was a holiday, or "hollow 
Day," as Putnam, the elder, wrote it in his diary. 
On Sunday came another sermon; this time it was 
at "ye oald Englesh Church." This was Trinity 
Church, on the site of which, in New York, an- 
other Trinity Church building now stands, sur- 
rounded by its old graveyard, a restful oasis in the 
midst of towering skyscrapers. 

During the next two weeks preparations for 
the voyage went briskly forward, and on January 

176 



"COMPANY OF MILITARY ADVENTURERS" 

lo, 1773, the Company of Military Adventurers, 
with their young companion, set sail in their good 
ship Mississippi. 

On January 25 they crossed the Tropic of Can- 
cer, and a few days later sailed among the Bahama 
Islands. On January 31 they entered the harbor 
of St. Nicholas' Mole, on the northwestern end of 
the Island of Haiti. They stayed there four days, 
which gave Daniel a chance to explore this strange 
new tropical country, with its dark-skinned people, 
and beautiful tropical vegetation. On February 4 
they coasted along the rocky coast of Haiti, saw 
on their right Cuba, on the shore of which Daniel's 
father had been wrecked in the Havana campaign 
ten years before, neared the north coast of Jamaica 
and landed at Montego Bay. 

There the three Putnams went to visit a Jamaica 
plantation. Daniel was frightened when a savage 
dog attacked the manager, who was showing them 
about. But if he was anything like a modern boy, 
he could not help laughing, even if he did his best 
to conceal it decorously, when his father, in an at- 
tempt to drive the dog away, fell backward into a 
vat of Jamaica rum, the principal product of the 

177 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

plantation ! This necessitated a hasty return on Is- 
rael's part to the ship, to change his rum-soaked 
garments. 

The next day it was discovered that the town 
was full of smallpox, so no one ventured from the 
ship who had not had the disease. They weighed 
anchor that day and took their leave of Jamaica. 

They sailed northwest to Cape San Antonio, 
Cuba, encountering extremely hot weather and be- 
ing delayed by a calm, so that it took them a week 
to make the short voyage. Thence they sailed for 
Pensacola, Florida, reaching there in ten days. 
There was an English army post there, and Daniel's 
father met two of his old friends of the French 
and Indian War, General Frederick Haldimand, of 
the St. Lawrence expedition, and Major John Small. 

The Military Adventurers were exceedingly sur- 
prised and disappointed at this place to find that no 
royal instructions had been received in Florida re- 
garding their supposed grant of land on the Mis- 
sissippi. "However," as Rufus Putnam wrote in 
his diary, "the possibility of its yet arriving, with 
the proposal made for granting Lands to the com- 
pany on terms within the power of the Governor 

178 



"COMPANY OF MILITARY ADVENTURERS" 

and Council Induced the Committee to resolve on 
proceeding on the business of reconnoitering the 
country on the Mississippi and to make such Sur- 
veys as we might think proper," 

They set sail in their sloop again, on the daz- 
zling blue water of the Gulf of Mexico, and four 
days later came in sight of the archipelagos of 
small islands which guard the mouth of the Missis- 
sippi. They turned, and were soon in the main 
channel of the river, wide, yellow and sunny, flow- 
ing between low banks lined with endless brakes 
of Cottonwood and willow. Daniel, who was keep- 
ing a, sharp lookout, presently saw a long, widening 
ripple in the water, and cried, "Alligators!" Sure 
enough, it was one. On their way up the river 
Israel Putnam shot three. 

On March 30 they reached New Orleans, a 
French town which had been ceded, together with 
the rest of French Louisiana, to the Spaniards, ten 
years before, but which still kept its French cus- 
toms and population. There were about three thou- 
sand two hundred inhabitants here, of whom a 
third were negro slaves. The Military Adventurers 
landed at the dike by the water front; found the 

179 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

streets unpaved, sometimes almost impassable, and 
swarming with reptiles, and the houses all built up 
on stilts about fifteen feet from the ground. The 
main part of the little town was very squalid, but 
out on the Bayou Road were the handsome resi- 
dences of the French planters, red-roofed houses 
surrounded with wide verandas, in the midst of 
indigo and myrtle plantations. Through the open 
doors Daniel caught glimpses of lofty halls lead- 
ing to spacious drawing-rooms, where beautiful 
Creole girls, dressed with foreign elegance, talked 
and laughed with true French gayety, and were 
waited upon hand and foot by the numerous black 
slaves. 

The Military Adventurers stayed in New Or- 
leans about a week*; then, as their captain, for some 
reason, refused to take the sloop further, they con- 
tinued their trip in small boats or bateaux. They 
were free to continue up the river, since the Eng- 
lish owned the lands on the east side of the Mis- 
sissippi above Orleans Island. 

In a few days they came to an Acadian settle- 
ment. These Acadians, as perhaps you know from 
reading Longfellow's "Evangeline," had been taken 

1 80 



"COMPANY OF MILITARY ADVENTURERS'* 

by the English from their homes in Nova Scotia 
and scattered all over the colonies. Theirs was 
a sad fate, though history tells us, that from the 
point of view of the British Government, their re- 
moval was necessary, because the simple, obstinate 
peasants were so much under the influence of their 
French priests, who in turn made themselves tools 
of the French Government, that they refused to 
take the oath of allegiance to the English, in spite 
of fifty years of kind treatment on their side, and 
were therefore a source of great danger to the 
English in case of another war. 

There was no Longfellow yet to tell in poetry the 
story of the Acadians, but the Putnams heard it 
instead from the lips of the refugees themselves — 
of their "exile without an end, and without an ex- 
ample in story." Those who reached this far land 
of Louisiana were the happiest. They found there 
other French people to keep them company, a fruit- 
ful soil, and a far kindlier climate than in their 
lost Acadia. There they built them the long, low 
houses with wide galleries covered with climbing 
roses and honeysuckle vines, where the mocking 
birds made their nests, where the negroes laughed 

i8i 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

and sang in the negro cabins at the rear, and the 
boundless prairies stretched back of them, fertile 
pasture-lands for their herds of cattle. They might 
well have exclaimed to our wayfarers, as Basil 
the blacksmith does in the poem, 

Here no hungry winter congeals our blood like the rivers; 
Here no stony ground provokes the wrath of the farmer. 
Smoothly the ploughshare runs through the soil as a keel 
through the water. 

All the year round the orange groves are in blossom; 

and grass grows 
More in a single night than a whole Canadian summer. 
Here, too, numberless herds run wild and unclaimed in 

the prairies; 
Here, too, lands may be had for the asking, and forests 

of timber 
With a few blows of the axe are hewn and framed into 

houses. 
After your houses are built, and your fields are yellow 

with harvests, 
No King George of England shall drive ycu away from 

your homesteads. 
Burning your dwellings and barns, and stealing your farms 

and your cattle. 

There today their descendants form a distinct 
and numerous population. 

After stopping at this transplanted Acadia for 
182 



"COMPANY OF MILITARY ADVENTURERS" 

a day, the explorers went on up the Mississippi, 
sometimes rowing against the current and some- 
times advancing by means of tow-ropes pulled by 
a part of the crew on shore. It was a hard, hot, 
monotonous trip, and they were all glad to reach 
Fort Rosalie, the site of Natchez, four hundred 
miles from the Gulf. Fifty years before, the en- 
tire garrison, two hundred men, had been mas- 
sacred by the Natchez Indians, and the women and 
children carried away. The latter were afterward 
returned to New Orleans, and adopted by the peo- 
ple. From Natchez they turned and went fifty 
miles, nearly to the mouth of the Bayou Pierre. 
Bayou is a term used to describe those streams 
which take water from the Mississippi and empty 
it into the Gulf. They are caused by the deposit 
of silt, which blocks a part of the rhain channel 
of the stream. 

The scenery of this bayou was at first interesting 
to the Putnams, but soon grew monotonous. Day 
after day they glided over the brown water, be- 
tween swampy jungles, where the trees were draped 
heavily with the pall-like strands of the gray, hang- 
ing moss. Now and then a blue or a white heron 

183 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

took its silent flight over them, a vulture flapped 
heavily away from a dead branch, or the ripple of 
an alligator broke the mirror-like calmness of the 
stream. They retraced their way, reached the Mis- 
sissippi again, and then explored the Big Black 
River, a few miles above Natchez, in what is now 
the State of Mississippi. Israel Putnam and some 
of the others, with a Choctaw Indian as guide, set 
off on foot and did a good deal of exploring by 
land, getting almost to the Walnut Hills. They 
were stopped by a chief of the Choctaws, who for- 
bade them to go further, and showed them a com- 
mission he had received from Governor Chester, 
granting the Choctaws certain rights in this region. 
Upon hearing this, the party thought it best to 
return down the Mississippi, landing and exploring 
parts of the eastern bank on the way. A few 
miles below the Bayou Manchac, nearly a hundred 
miles from the mouth of the Mississippi, they found 
their sloop, which the captain had brought up the 
river to meet them. They gladly embarked in it, 
and after a few days came in sight of the small, 
reedy islands, and the bright green sea-marshes of 
Mississippi Sound. Then the wind blew keen and 

184 



"COMPANY OF MILITARY ADVENTURERS" 

cool upon them, and the broad, bright expanse 
of the Gulf burst upon their eyes, weary of the 
brown water and monotonous windings of the Mis- 
sissippi. 

In three weeks they were in New York again. 
This time Daniel was not so anxious to explore 
the city, for he could hardly wait to get back to 
Pom fret and tell his family and boy friends of all 
the things he had seen. He and his father and 
cousin Rufus, took passage on a sloop for Nor- 
wich. Their dangers were not yet over; the sloop 
sprung her mast, and they had trouble reaching 
port. But at last they were there, and then they 
took passage in a row-boat up the river, and 
made the last stage of the journey home by horse- 
back, which seemed to Daniel and his father a re- 
markably solid and comfortable way of traveling 
after all the months of water journey. By August 
12 they were back at Wolfe Tavern — and Daniel 
probably put on such airs over his travels that his 
stepbrother and sister and the younger Putnam 
children wished that he had never gone. 

But it seemed that things had happened and 
were happening in New England which made the 

185 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

Southland tame by comparison. Daniel's inter- 
est in the Mississippi faded into the background 
when, soon after his return, he heard his elders 
vehemently discussing the tax on tea, which they 
were resolved not to pay, because it stood for the 
principle of taxation without representation, hated 
by the colonies. He heard that a large cargo of 
the tea had been shipped to Boston. 

"What will be done with it?" he asked his father. 

"I don't know — but it will never be landed," was 
Israel's reply. 

Soon after the seventeenth of December the news 
of the Boston Tea Party reached the Putnams. The 
patriots of Boston had defied the King's authority 
and dumped the tea into the harbor rather than 
pay duty on it. During the action, not a person 
was harmed nor other property injured. The mob 
— if mob it could be called — was not rioting — it 
was acting in defense of a principle. Putnam ex- 
plained this to his children. He wanted them to 
know the real meaning of the disturbance. He 
told them that the liberty of their country was at 
stake, and that he was ready to fight to defend it 
if necessary. 

i86 



XV 
ON TO BOSTON! 



XV 

ON TO BOSTON! 

IN July, 1774, the Connecticut people heard that 
the British Government had retaliated upon 
Massachusetts by taking from her the power 
to choose her own officers and representatives in 
the Assembly, by sending troops to Boston, and 
by closing the Boston port to all but warships. 
This meant the stopping of all trade and nearly 
all business — it meant starvation for Boston, un- 
less sufficient supplies could reach her over the nar- 
row isthmus that connected the city with the main- 
land. 

As soon as he heard the news, Colonel Putnam 
was astir. He got on his horse and rode all over 
his part of Connecticut, asking people for supplies 
to send to Boston. In a few days he had collected 
a drove of one hundred and thirty sheep, of which 
his own farm had furnished a large number. Some 
men would have sent these to Boston under the care 

189 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

of a farm laborer, but not so Putnam. He was 
not too great a man to escort the sheep all the way 
to the distressed city himself. He was greeted in 
Boston with great enthusiasm, and stayed at the 
house of Dr. Joseph Warren, a young man who 
was one of the most prominent patriots in Massa- 
chusetts. 

The British army had its quarters on Boston 
Common, and many of the officers there were 
friends of Putnam — General Gage, Major Small, 
Lx)rd Percy, and others. Putnam went to see them. 
They entered into friendly, but hot, political dis- 
cussions. Major Small bantered him about coming 
down to fight. 

"Twenty ships-of-the-line and twenty regiments 
may be expected from England," he told Putnam, 
"in case a submission is not speedily made by Bos- 
ton." 

"If they come," said Putnam quickly, "I am 
ready to treat them as enemies." 

Other officers, who had not heard this retort, 
asked him what part he would take in case of 
war. 

"I shall take part with my country in any event," 
190 



ON TO BOSTON! 

answered Putnam, without a second's hesitation. 

"Can you, who have seen so many EngHsh 
victories of fleets and armies, doubt that the Eng- 
lish can easily acquire a country which does not 
own a single ship, regiment, or magazine?" they 
asked. 

"I can only say," answered the Connecticut 
Colonel, "that justice would be on our side, and the 
event with Providence. But I have calculated that 
if it took the combined forces of England and her 
colonies six years to conquer such a feeble coun- 
try as Canada, it would take, at least, a very long 
time for England alone to overcome her own widely 
extended colonies, which are much stronger than 
Canada. When men fight for everything dear, in 
what they believe the most sacred of all causes, and 
in their own native land, they have great advan- 
tages over their enemies who are not in the same 
situation. For my part, having considered all the 
circumstances, I fully believe America would not 
be so easily conquered by England as you gentle- 
men seem to expect!" 

"Seriously now, Colonel Putnam," asked an of- 
ficer, "don't you think a well-appointed British army 

191 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

of five thousand veterans could march through the 
whole continent of America?" 

"No doubt they could," replied Putnam, with a 
twinkle in his eye. "No doubt they could, if they 
behaved civilly, and paid well for everything they 
wanted. But," he went on, "if they should attempt 
it in a hostile manner (though the American men 
were out of the question), the women, with their 
ladles and broomsticks, would knock them all on 
the head before they had got halfway through!" 

After a few days Putnam returned home. He 
had hardly reached there when he received a let- 
ter from a Boston gentleman saying that the Brit- 
ish troops and artillery had fired upon the Boston 
people on the preceding night, and that men from 
all over New England were hastening to the spot. 

Putnam had no reason to disbelieve the letter. 
He sent it on by messenger, and himself alarmed 
the countryside. Soon the roads to Boston were 
crowded with people. Putnam was ahead of them, 
with a few companions. They had not gone far 
when they met a messenger who told them that 
it was all a mistake, and that the alarm had been 
caused by General Gage's sending some soldiers to 

192 



ON TO BOSTON! 

seize some powder and cannon in Charlestown. 
Putnam at once returned and sent the people he 
met back to their homes. The occurrence had 
showed what a force could be raised at a few hours* 
notice, and greatly alarmed the British in Boston. 

The Assembly of Massachusetts, which had been 
dissolved, organized itself into a Provincial Con- 
gress, appointed Committees of Safety and Sup- 
plies, and voted to raise an army of twelve thou- 
sand men. All over New England the militia or- 
ganized and drilled on the village greens. Many 
of them were, like Putnam, experienced fighters in 
the previous war. One-fourth part of them were 
ready to fight at a minute's notice, and were called 
minutemen. Meanwhile the blockade of Boston 
went on, the friction between the British and the 
Colonials increased steadily, and Gage determined 
to make an aggressive movement. He sent out sol- 
diers to seize the military stores collected at Con- 
cord, Mass. 

One warm day in April, 1765, Israel Putnam and 
his son Daniel were plowing in the fields. Sud- 
denly they heard the sound of galloping hoofs and 
the rat-tat-tat of a drum. A man on horseback 

193 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

was galloping down the road. He reined up his 
horse for a moment and shouted, "War's begun! 
British troops have fired upon our men at Lexing- 
ton, and we chased them all the way to Cambridge !" 
then passed on, in a cloud of dust. 

Colonel Putnam dropped the handle of his plow 
and unharnessed his horse. 

"Go home and tell your mother that I've gone 
to Boston !" he cried to Daniel. He mounted the 
farm horse and was off down the road. 

Daniel gazed after him with his mouth open. It 
had all happened so quickly that he felt as if he 
must be dreaming. Then he realized that he was 
not, and that he must go home and deliver his 
message. But how he longed to be on the way to 
Boston, too! And, presently, he was to have his 
wish. 

The next day "Old Put" was in Boston. He 
had traveled not less than one hundred miles on 
horseback in twenty-four hours, for he had gone 
out of his way to alarm the countryside. He 
attended a council of war in Cambridge the day 
he arrived, and the parole of the day was "Put- 
nam," in his honor. 

194 



ON TO BOSTON! 

He found that the British were safely hemmed 
in in Boston, so he went away for a week to at- 
tend the session of the Connecticut Legislature at 
Hartford and help in the levying of troops. He 
was given the rank of Second Brigadier-General 
of the Connecticut forces. His influence and repu- 
tation induced many Connecticut men to join the 
army. Men who had been in the French and Ca- 
nadian War were especially anxious to fight under 
brave "Old Put." Putnam soon returned to Cam- 
bridge, making arrangements for his troops to fol- 
low him. 

Soon sixteen thousand New England men were 
besieging General Gage in Boston. Their camps 
were stretched out in a great semi-circle, all the 
way from Jamaica Plain to Charlestown Neck. Ar- 
temas Ward was commander-in-chief. His head- 
quarters were at Cambridge, and he kept Putnam 
with one regiment near him there so that he could 
ask his advice. 

Putnam was busy all the time. His son Daniel 
had managed to join him, and has left us a very 
interesting account of what he observed of his 
father's doings. "His experience had taught him," 

195 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

he said, "that raw and undisciplined troops must 
be employed in some way or other, or they would 
soon become vicious and unmanageable. His 
maxim was, *It is better to dig a ditch every morn- 
ing and fill it up at evening than to have the men 
idle.' " However, there was plenty of real work to 
do in throwing up defenses at Cambridge at vari- 
ous points. Putnam was said by an eyewitness to 
be "constantly on horseback or on foot, working 
with his men or encouraging them." A soldier 
who was not working as hard as he might told 
afterwards that "Old Put" demanded of him and 
his comrades to what regiment they belonged. "To 
Colonel Doolittle's," they replied. 

"Doolittle? Do no^^^hing at all!" exclaimed "Old 
Put" scathingly. 

General Gage heard that Putnam was leading a 
part of the forces that were besieging Boston, and 
as he knew that he had many warm friends among 
the British officers, he hoped that he might be pre- 
vailed upon to come over to the British side. He 
accordingly sent a secret messenger to Putnam 
saying that if he would turn Loyalist he might 
count upon being made a Major-General of the Brit- 

ig6 



ON TO BOSTON! 

ish army, and would receive a great deal of money 
for his services. Needless to say, General Putnam 
refused the ofYer with contempt. 

Gage had plenty of reason to wish Putnam 
with him instead of against him. Some popu- 
lar verses about the siege of Boston, written by 
John Trumbull, a patriot of the time, give an idea 
of the state of affairs. 

Nay, stern with rage, grim Putnam boiling, 
Plundered both Hogg and Noddle Island; 
Scared troops of Tories into town, 
Burned all their hay and houses down, 
And menaced Gage unless he'd flee. 
To drive him headlong to the sea. 

And the poet goes on, speaking of an agreement 
which Gage had violated to let the people of Boston 
leave town : 

So Gage of late agreed you know. 

To let the Boston people go, 

Yet when he saw, 'gainst troops that braved him, 

They were the only guards that saved him. 

Kept off that Satan of a Putnam, 

From breaking in to maul and mutt'n him. 

He'd too much wit such leagues to observe, 

And shut them in again to starve. 

197 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

There are references here to some exciting skir- 
mishes Putnam commanded, during which droves 
of valuable livestock were safely driven ashore at 
low tide from Hog Island and Noddle Island, in 
Boston Harbor, under the fire of British armed ves- 
sels and the British battery in what is now East 
Boston. The patriots during the Noddle Island 
skirmish set fire to one British schooner and dis- 
abled a British sloop, capturing several ship can- 
non and other valuable property. 

A good many prisoners having been taken on each 
side in the skirmishes around Boston, an exchange 
was provided for. General Putnam and Dr. War- 
ren were appointed to receive them on the Ameri- 
can side. When they reached Cambridge, the place 
of the exchange, they found Majors Moncreifife and 
Small in charge of the British prisoners. Both 
were old friends of Putnam. He fairly ran into 
their arms. It is said that he kissed them. His 
heart was too warm to let political differences inter- 
fere with personal feelings. When the exchange 
was completed, all the officers went to the house of 
Dr. Foster nearby, and had a friendly meal and 
visit ; then they separated to their respective armies. 

198 



ON TO BOSTON! 

Three more British generals arrived on the twen- 
ty-fifth of May — Sir William Howe, a brother of 
the popular young officer who had been killed at Ti- 
conderoga, Sir Henry Clinton, and Burgoyne. They 
brought reenforcements from England which raised 
Gage's army to ten thousand men. The patriots 
heard that Gage planned to seize Dorchester 
Heights on the night of June i8. They determined 
to anticipate him, and a council of officers was held. 

Putnam had been urging for weeks that they 
make a bold movement and seize Bunker Hill. 
When Ward and Warren opposed the idea, on the 
ground that they had very little gunpowder and 
no battering cannon, he said that he did not expect 
to shell Boston, but to draw the enemy out where 
they might meet them on equal terms in battle. He 
said that the army was eager for an engagement, 
and tired of doing nothing; that he only wished to 
risk two thousand men, and that they would set 
their country an example of which it would not be 
ashamed, and show those who oppressed them what 
men could do who were determined to live free or 
not live at all ! 

Young Dr. Warren answered, "Almost thou per- 
199 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

suadest me, General Putnam, but I must still think 
the project a rash one. Nevertheless, if it should 
ever be adopted and the strife becomes hard, you 
must not be surprised to find me with you in the 
midst of it." 

"I hope not, sir," said Putnam, "you are yet but 
a young man, and our country has much to hope 
from you both in council and in war. It is only a 
little brush we have been contemplating; let some 
of us who are older and can well enough be spared 
begin the fray; there will be time enough for you 
hereafter, for it will not soon be ended." 



XVI 
BUNKER HILL 



XVI 
BUNKER HILL 

AFFAIRS had now come to a point where 
Putnam's plan was the only one to follow. 
At sunset, June i6, a brigade of twelve 
hundred men, under the command of Colonel Pres- 
cott, of Pepperell, Maine, paraded on Cambridge 
Common, where prayers were said by Dr. Langdon, 
President of Harvard College. When darkness 
came, the little army, guided by two servants carry- 
ing dark lanterns, felt their way over Charlestown 
Neck in almost perfect silence. Once across, there 
was a discussion among the leaders whether Bunker 
Hill, or Breed's Hill, nearer the harbor, should be 
fortified. Breed's Hill was finally decided upon, 
and at midnight the soldiers fell to throwing up 
earthworks. 

Putnam had been stationed by General Ward back 
of the Neck at a point which the latter thought 
would be attacked by the British in an effort to cut 

203 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

off the Colonials' retreat from the Neck. But sup- 
erintendence of this did not take up Putnam's whole 
time, and he simply could not bear to keep out of 
what was going on on the Hill. Though everything 
had been kept secret the day before, his son Daniel, 
who was at his father's post, knew that the latter 
was to be in some important action. We have 
Daniel's own account of his father's leave-taking. 

"A little after sunset my father called me aside 
and said, *You will go to Mrs. Inman's as usual to- 
night, and it is time you were gone. You need not 
return here in the morning, but stay there tomor- 
row; the family may want you and if they find it 
necessary to leave the house, you must go with 
them where they go ; and try now, my son, to be as 
serviceable to them as you can.' " 

Mrs. Inman was the wife of a Tory refugee in 
Boston. She and her family lived on a farm near 
Putnam's post, which was surrounded by "rebel" 
troops, and kindhearted General Putnam stationed 
Daniel at her hous^ in order that she might feel 
protected amongst those whom she considered her 
enemies. 

"This order," says Daniel, "connected with what 
204 




. ISRAEl/ PUTNAM FA'ql 



Israel Putnam 
From a portrait by Wilkinson 



BUNKER HILL 

I had seen during the day, left no doubt in my 
mind that some military movement was going for- 
ward in which my father was to participate. I 
called to mind his abstraction and self-commun- 
ing, the broken sentences that had escape him, indi- 
cating battle and blood-shedding, and my imagina- 
tion pictured him as mangled with wounds and none 
to help him. With earnest entreaty I asked leave 
to accompany him. 'You, dear father,' I said, 'may 
need my assistance much more than Mrs. Inman; 
pray let me go where you are going.' — *No, no, 
Daniel, do as I have bid you,' was the answer which 
he affected to give sternly, while his voice trembled 
and his eyes filled. Then, as if perfectly compre- 
hending what had been passing in my mind, he 
added, 'You can do little, my son, where I am going, 
and besides, there will be enough to take care of 
me. 

"I went as directed to Mrs. Inman's, but took no 
interest in the conversation of her nieces or the 
maternal kindness of their aunt ; my mind was else- 
where, and I retired early to bed, but not to sleep; 
the night was as sleepless to me as to those who 
were toiling or watching on the confines of Boston. 

205 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

I had a strong suspicion that Charlestown was the 
spot to which the hostile movement was directed; 
and long before the first gun was fired I had risen 
and seated myself at the window of my chamber, 
anxiously looking thitherward." 

The daybreak that Daniel waited for came all 
too soon to the workers on Breed's Hill. They had 
had only three short hours of darkness during which 
to raise defenses. When it grew light, those on the 
British ships perceived what was going on and 
commenced firing. Luckily the trenches were deep 
enough already for the men to shelter themselves. 

The people in Boston heard the cannon, and 
crowded the housetops to see what was going on. 
It was as if a drop curtain had gone up, and they 
were spectators at some enthralling play. There 
were Tories there who applauded every shot from 
the ships' guns; there were patriots, who, like 
Daniel, trembled because their near relatives were 
out in the trenches. 

At noon the British landed troops on the shore 
below Breed's Hill. Howe led them, supported by 
many other brave English officers. The English 
had decided to attack the Americans in front. They 

206 



BUNKER HILL 

did not think the rebels would give them much 
trouble. 

Putnam had spent a strenuous night and morn- 
ing. Eye-witnesses have described how he gal- 
loped here and there on his white horse. He was in 
his shirt-sleeves, with an old white felt hat on his 
head. One minute he would be at Bunker Hill, 
furiously urging on the fortifications there, which 
he was determined not to give up — it was against 
his advice that they had moved on to fortify Breed's 
Kill — at another he was bringing up cannon to the 
front — at another he was riding across the Neck, 
now raked by shell from the enemy's ships, on his 
way back to Cambridge to beg slow, timid old Gen- 
eral Ward to send reenforcements. He did not have 
charge of the battle, but he was the life and soul of 
it, inspiring tihe men, shaming cowards, urging 
everything forward. 

When the British actually landed, Putnam hur- 
ried to the front. He knew now that the post Gen- 
eral Ward had given him in the rear was not threat- 
ened and that he could leave it permanently. He 
saw that the earthwork on Breed's Hill was still 
incomplete. A place on the left was undefended. 

207 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

Putnam ordered a rail fence some distance back 
pulled up and placed behind another, with hay be- 
tween, to form a fairly effective breastwork. He 
stationed soldiers behind it. 

Warren came on the field, as he had threatened 
he would. Putnam again remonstrated. He was 
not half so anxious to have other and younger offi- 
cers risk their lives as he was to risk his own. 

"I am sorry to see you here, Creneral Warren," 
he said. "I wish you had left the day to us, as I 
advised you. From appearances, we shall have a 
sharp time of it. But, since you are here, I will 
receive your orders with pleasure." 

Dr. Warren was now President of the Provincial 
Congress of Massachusetts, and had also recently 
been appointed a major-general in the army of his 
colony. He therefore was of higher rank than 
Putnam. 

The young man replied modestly, "I came only 
as a volunteer; I know nothing of your disposi- 
tions, and will not interfere with them; tell me 
where I can be most useful." 

Putnam directed him to the redoubt which Col- 
onel Prescott's men had built. Pie thought it the 

208 



BUNKER HILL 

safest place, and said, "You will be covered there." 

"Do not think I come to seek a place of safety," 
answered Warren indignantly. "Tell me where 
the onset will be most furious." 

Putnam again pointed to the redoubt. "That," 
said he, "is the enemy's object. Prescott is there, 
and will do his duty. If that can be defended, the 
day is ours ; but, from long experience of the char- 
acter of the enemy, I think they will finally succeed, 
and drive us from the works; though, from the 
mode of attack which they have chosen, we shall be 
able to do them infinite injury; and we must be 
prepared for a brave and orderly retreat, when we 
can maintain our ground no longer." 

Warren thanked him, and went to the redoubt. 
The men there cheered him, and Prescott offered 
him the command, which he again declined. 

Old General Seth Pomeroy, now in his seventieth 
year, and one of Putnam's bravest comrades in the 
Crown Point campaign, had, in spite of feeble 
health, ridden from his home in Northampton to 
attend the battle. When he reached the Neck, he 
found it so swept by the enemy's fire, that he was 
afraid to risk his borrowed horse on it, so he dis- 

209 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

mounted and walked across. As he strode up the 
Hill, gun in hand, Putnam saw him and exclaimed, 
"By God, Pomeroy, you here! A cannon-shot 
would waken you out of your grave!" 

Meanwhile the British were drawn up on the 
strand below, waiting for reenforcements. Putnam 
rode across the Neck again at peril of his life and 
at last persuaded General Ward to send more 
troops. The New Hampshire troops and Putnam's 
Connecticut men were ordered to the front. Put- 
nam assigned them to their posts and generally 
directed the forces not commanded by Prescott. 

Rat-tat-tat f The drums were calling the British 
to action. They advanced in solid ranks over the 
green grass of the meadows. They wore bright 
red coats, with white belts. Their arms flashed in 
the sun of the hot June day. They were some of 
the best regiments of Old England, led by gallant 
officers. 

Nearer and nearer they came, while the American 
farmers waited for them in the trenches. This was 
their first battle against English troops. They were 
badly organized and practically undisciplined. They 
had worked all night and half the hot June day with- 

2IO 



BUNKER HILL 

out a bite to eat or a drop to drink ; they were nearly 
fagged out. Could they stand their ground against 
the King's trained army? 

There was no doubt as to that question in Put- 
nam's mind, anyway. He had fought with these 
same New England farmers. He knew what they 
were made of. His only fear was that they would 
fire too soon. He rode along the line giving orders. 

"Men, you are all of you marksmen — don't one 
of you fire until you see the whites of their eyes!" 

"Powder is scarce and must not be wasted." 

"Fire low." 

"Take aim at the waistbands." 

"Aim at the handsome coats — pick off the com- 
manders." 

Similar orders were given by Prescott, Pomeroy, 
Stark and other veteran officers. 

The British advanced steadily. Gage had blun- 
dered in making each of his redcoats carry one hun- 
dred pounds of provisions besides their heavy arms 
and ammunition. They were cramped by their tight 
coats ; they sweated and panted. But their courage 
was firm. They thought they would have no trou- 
ble storming the lines of these rascally rebels. Howe 

211 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

planned first to take the redoubt which Prescott 
commanded. 

They were within eight rods of it when the 
Americans fired. Each Yankee had leveled his 
flintlock at some particular soldier. When the shots 
blazed out the British lines shivered and fell like 
grass before the mower. The men were in heaps, 
struggling, groaning and dying. Their blood 
stained the bright green grass. General Pigot had 
to give the word to retreat. 

Meanwhile General Howe led his men to the rail 
fence. Some of Putnam's men here had discharged 
their muskets too soon. Putnam rode frantically 
behind the lines threatening to cut down with his 
sword the next ofiFender. When the British were 
at the right distance, his men fired in a body — again, 
when the smoke cleared away, the same terrible 
scenes were visible. Here too the British had to 
retreat. They had been hampered by the failure of 
their artillery to work properly. The Master of 
Ordnance had made a mistake and sent cannon balls 
which were too large. 

The English were not ready to give up, but ral- 
lied for another charge. Again the deadly Ameri- 

212 



BUNKER HILL 

can fire worked fearful havoc with their ranks. The 
British shot mostly went over the heads of the 
Americans. 

Putnam, besides directing the gun-fire at the rail- 
fence, had been trying to get the artillery into action. 
Colonel Gerrish had some artillery, but he could 
not or would not bring his pieces forward. His 
men had not been trained to use artillery, and they 
had all scattered. General Putnam came to one 
of the pieces, and furiously inquired where the offi- 
cers were. A soldier told him that the cartridges 
were too big and could not be loaded. Putnam said 
they could be loaded. He took a cartridge, broke it 
open, and loaded it with pieces with a ladle. He 
helped the soldiers to load two or three others in 
the same way, and the cannon were discharged. He 
found an artillery officer retreating behind a hill, 
and threatened him with instant death if he did not 
go back. He finally had the men drag the artil- 
lery to the rail fence, where he directed the dis- 
charges. 

The British had set fire to Charlestown, and a 
detachment of the British, under cover of the smoke, 
tried to gain the rear of the Americans. Putnam's 

213 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

sharp old eyes detected the movement, and he plied 
his cannon with such effect that the British were 
beaten back. 

But with bull-dog courage, the English charged 
for the third time. The powder of the Americans 
was nearly exhausted. They resorted to muskets, 
and picked off the officers. Three times General 
Howe was left alone, so many of his staff had fallen 
around him. It is thought the reason the Americans 
spared him was the affection they had felt for his 
splendid brother, who died at Ticonderoga. It is 
known that Major Small's life was spared through 
Putnam's intervention. Small saw several Ameri- 
can marksmen leveling their pieces at him, and con- 
sidered himself as good as killed. Just then Put- 
nam rushed forward, struck up the muzzles of the 
pieces with his sword, and cried out, "For God's 
sake, my lads, don't fire at that man! I love 
him as I do my brother." Small heard him dis- 
tinctly, bowed, thanked him, and walked away un- 
harmed. 

Putnam's action was reciprocated by another 
English officer, Colonel Abercrombie, who, as he lay 
dying in front of the redoubt, exclaimed, *Tf you 

214 



BUNKER HILL 

take General Putnam alive, don't hang him, for he 
is a brave fellow," 

At last the Americans' powder was completely- 
gone. They clubbed their muskets and fought with 
them. Then they began hurling stones from the 
breastworks. But the British now knew their weak- 
ness. They swept on. Pigot scaled the redoubt, 
followed by his men. Prescott had to (5rder a 
retreat, which was accomplished by his men in an 
orderly manner. Prescott and Warren were the 
last to leave the redoubt, Warren had just left it 
when a bullet struck him in the forehead, and he 
fell, dying. 

Putnam was riding up and down on the slope be- 
hind the Neck, shouting to some late reenf orcements 
to hurry to the front. "Press on, press on," he 
cried. "Our brethren are suffering, and will be 
cut off," The musket-balls flew around him, but 
he never noticed them. Then he hurried to the 
front again. His men at the rail fence were the 
last to retreat, and he could not believe that they 
were actually forced to do so. Not realizing that 
their powder was all gone, he begged them wildly 
to rally and renew the fight. 

215 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

"Make a stand here," he shouted, waving his 
sword in the air. "We can stop them yet!" "In 
God's name form and give them one shot more." 
This was at Bunker Hill, which he still hoped might 
be defended. But the soldiers pressed on past him. 
"Halt, you damned cowards," he yelled, "halt and 
give them another shot." ("Old Put" apologized 
long afterwards to his church for the violent lan- 
guage he used at Bunker Hill. "But it was enough 
to make an angel swear," he declared, "to see the 
rascals run away from the British!") 

At last he took his stand near a field-piece and 
seemed determined to brave the foe alone. His 
troops had left, and one cannot blame them. One 
sergeant only dared to stand with Putnam; he was 
shot down, and the enemy's bayonets were just upon 
the General when he retreated. 

The General is immortalized in this final stand 
both in picture and verse. Opposite page 216 you 
will see a reproduction of a picture by Trumbull, 
where Putnam, in the rear, is waving his sword at 
the enemy. Joel Barlow, a Yale graduate who 
wrote the "Vision of Columbus," soon after the 
Revolution, says: 

216 



BUNKER HILL 

There strides bold Putnam, and from all the plains. 
Calls the third host, the tardy rear sustains, 
And, 'mid the whizzing deaths that fill the air, 
Waves back his sword, and dares the following war. 

Putnam's retreat marks the end of the Battle of 
Bunker Hill. The Americans had lost the battle, 
but they had gained a victory. They had proved 
their mettle ; they had forced the British back again 
and again, and given the British officers such an 
opinion of their valor and marksmanship that many 
times afterward during the Revolution the English 
generals, especially Howe, hesitated to attack when 
thej might have done so. At White Plains and 
at the Battle of Brooklyn Heights the influence of 
Bunker Hill was felt, and prevented American de- 
feat. The Battle of Bunker Hill encouraged wav- 
ering Americans to join the patriot side, and heart- 
ened all the colonies. Howe might well have said 
with the general of old, "Another such victory, and 
we are undone !" 

"I wish we could sell them another hill at the 
same price," said General Greene. Washington de- 
clared that now there could be no doubt that the 
liberties of the people were secure. Benjamin 

217 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

Franklin prophesied that England had lost her col- 
onies forever. 

Israel Putnam said nothing that has been handed 
down to us. He had fought in the battle, and that 
was enough for him. 



XVII 
AT NEW YORK 



XVII 
AT NEW YORK 



I 



*^HE morning after the Battle of Bunker 
Hill, Daniel Putnam, who had faithfully 
staid by the Inmans during this trying 
time, at last felt that he could leave them and hasten 
to Cambridge. He had heard that his father was 
safe, but could hardly believe it, so many were the 
tales of the danger he had been in. He was much 
relieved, therefore, when, after some search, he 
found him in charge of the workmen who were 
fortifying Prospect Hill, where the troops had re- 
treated. The General was dashing about as if he 
had not been up for two nights and a day before. 
He wore the same clothes he had on when Daniel 
left him, and said he had not put them off nor 
washed himself for thirty-eight hours. Daniel said 
he certainly looked it ! He and the officers near per- 
suaded the valiant old gentleman to go to his quar- 
ters and take some refreshment and rest, 

221 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

On the second of July, 1775, under the branches 
of the elm-tree which still stands on Harvard Com- 
mon, Washington, who had just arrived in Cam- 
bridge from Philadelphia, took formal command of 
the Continental army. He had brought with him 
commissions from Congress for four major-gen- 
erals : Ward, Charles Lee, Philip Schuyler and 
Putnam. Putnam's was the only one he ordered 
delivered at once upon his arrival. There was 
some doubt about the suitability of the others, but 
there was no doubt about his. 

Washington was not acquainted with Putnam 
when he came, but he soon grew to know and like 
him. One day, observing him directing the soldiers 
in the making of some defenses, Washington said, 
"You seem to have the faculty, sir, of infusing your 
own industrious spirit into all the workmen you 
employ." In one of his letters from Cambridge to 
the President of Congress about the same time, he 
speaks of Putnam as "a most valuable man, and a 
fine executive officer." 

The Father of his Country was, as we all know, 
a serious person, but Putnam, on one occasion, was 
too much for even his gravity. One day General 

222 



AT NEW YORK 

Washington, looking out from an upper window, 
saw the following astounding sight : General Put- 
nam at full gallop on horseback, holding a very- 
large, fat lady astride in front of his saddle! It 
was one of the few times in Washington's life that 
he was overcome with laughter. When he could 
control his features he went downstairs and learned 
that the woman was a dangerous spy whom Putnam 
had discovered and lost no time in bringing to 
headquarters. Washington was one of those who 
called Putnam "Old Put," and the nickname shows 
the affection in which the great man held our 
hero. 

The British had not moved from Boston, with 
the exception of their action at Bunker Hill. The 
Americans were still besieging them. Putnam con- 
tinued to work as hard as ever, directing the build- 
ing of earthworks on Prospect and Winter Hills. 
Once he noticed a man hanging back from work. 
He told him to place some sods on the wall, saying, 
"You are a soldier, I suppose?" The man did not 
obey the order at once. "Oh, I see you are an offi- 
cer," said the old General, and immediately went to 
work and put the sods in position himself. Mean- 

223 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

while, the balls were continually pouring in from 
the British forts, killing the men and tearing the 
works. 

The Americans could not accomplish anything of 
importance for many months on account of their 
scarcity of ammunition and cannon. At last, in 
the following spring, Washington received a num- 
ber of cannon brought by Henry Knox from Ticon- 
deroga on sledges. He resolved to seize Dorches- 
ter Heights. At the council of war, where the 
officers met to plan the attack, Putnam was restless, 
continually going to doors and windows, to see 
what was going on outside. 

"Sit down, General Putnam," Washington 
begged ; "we must have your advice and counsel in 
this matter, where the responsibility of its execution 
is devolved upon you." 

"Oh, my dear General," answered Putnam, "you 
may plan the battle to suit yourself, and I will fight 
it!" 

The plan at that time was to have four thousand 
men embark on the Charles River under the gen- 
eral command of Putnam, capture Beacon Hill and 
the Neck, while the British were engaged at Dor- 

224 




j 7 YUC /^ iL/nu 771 



From a Portrait by Trumbull 



AT NEW YORK 

Chester Heights, which it was supposed that they 
intended attacking; but later circumstances made 
this plan impracticable, and Washington himself 
seized Dorchester Heights on the night of March 4, 
under cover of a cannonading of Somerville, East 
Cambridge, and Roxbury. 

The British were now at the mercy of the be- 
siegers, and soon after Howe began to embark his 
troops. Boston was completely evacuated on the 
morning of March 30, and Putnam led the Ameri- 
can troops into their regained city, amid great re- 
joicings from the patriots who had been cooped up 
there all winter. 

Soon after, Putnam was sent by Washington to 
New York, to superintend the preparations for de- 
fense there. Putnam had his headquarters at No. I 
Broadway, where his family and Aaron Burr, then 
a young man of twenty and his aide-de-camp, 
joined him. There were many Tories in town, and 
Putnam had to put the city under martial law to 
prevent disturbances. Washington soon arrived, 
and preparations went on as quickly as possible for 
fortifying Brooklyn Heights and other points, sink- 
ing ships in the channels of the Hudson and the 

225 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

East River to prevent the British navy passing 
above them, and so on. 

General Howe had sailed for Halifax, and did 
not come to New York till the last of June. But 
then he arrived in full force, with more than a 
hundred men-of-war and transports. He seized 
Staten Island without any difficulty, for the Ameri- 
cans had few heavy cannon, and landed all his men 
there. The British ships managed to get past the 
obstructions in the Hudson and the East River, also. 

About this time Putnam heard of a man named 
Bushnell, who was so much ahead of his times that 
while he was at college he had invented a sort of 
submarine. He called it The American Turtle. 

Putnam sent Major Aaron Burr to invite the in- 
ventor to come to see him. He came, with a model 
of the Turtle, which was examined and approved 
by Putnam and other officers. Bushnell was given 
money to build his machine. 

In ten days the "submarine" was finished. It 
lived up to its name, for it looked something like a 
large sea-turtle. It had an air-tight compartment 
large enough to contain a man, and an apparatus 
for rowing. There was an opening at the bottom, 

226 



AT NEW YORK 

which admitted water, which made the boat de- 
scend. Two brass forcing pumps, worked by the 
operator, forced out the water, and permitted the 
boat to rise. To this vessel was attached by a screw 
a powder magazine made out of two pieces of hol- 
lowed oak timber. This the operator could release 
when he wished to. Inside the magazine, there was 
a piece of clockwork, which could be set for any 
desired time, and at the end of that time released 
a strong lock, which produced the explosion. 

The only difficulty was, who was to go down with 
the Turtle? The inventor himself could not, be- 
cause he was an invalid. His brother, however, 
who understood the mechanism, said he would go. 
But at the last minute he fell sick. A call for volun- 
teers was sent out, and finally Abijah Shipman, 
called "Long Bige," a sergeant from New London, 
responded. 

The rest of the story is told in a contemporary 
journal, Noah's Messenger. It may or may not be 
true, but anyway it sounds so. "Long Bige," it 
seems, was quite a character, a regular Yankee, and 
was passionately devoted to his quid of tobacco. 

Before daylight, on a July morning, he got on 
227 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

board the torpedo, intending to get under the bot- 
tom of the Eagle, the flagship of Admiral Howe. 
Putnam, Heath, Knowlton, Burr and other officers 
accompanied him to shore, where he was to embark. 

Abijah went on board the Turtle, and was about 
to screw himself in the air-tight compartment, when 
he suddenly stuck his head out. 

"Say, who's got a quid of tobacco?" he asked. 
"This old piece won't last, anyhow." He pulled 
out an ounce or more of the weed and threw it 
away. 

The officers laughed. They were not in the habit 
of chewing. Not one had a quid of tobacco. 

"You see how it is," said Putnam, jokingly, "we 
continental officers are too poor to raise even a to- 
bacco plug amongst us. But wait — tomorrow, after 
you have done your duty, some of the southern offi- 
cers shall give you an order for a keg of Old Vir- 
ginia." 

This promise did not console Abijah. "Mind, 
Gen'ral, if the old Turtle doesn't do her duty," he 
warned, "it's all because I go to sea without to- 
bacco." 

He screwed himself in, the machine was towed 
228 



AT NEW YORK 

into the river, cast off, and disappeared under the 
water. Putnam and the others waited an hour or 
more on the Battery, expected every moment to 
see the Eagle blown up. But nothing occurred. 

Morning came, and they were certain that some- 
thing had happened to poor Abijah. But suddenly 
Putnam, scanning the water through his field 
glasses, exclaimed, "There he is!" Sure enough, 
the top of the machine could be plainly seen emerg- 
ing from the water in a little bay to the left of the 
Eagle. The sentinel on the ship saw it also, and 
fired a volley of musketry at it. The Turtle dis- 
creetly ducked, while the Eagle, much alarmed, got 
under way in great haste. Putnam sent boats out 
from shore to pick up Abijah, if they could find him. 
He was taken up in his boat finally near Governor's 
Island. He had cast off the magazine, and it ex- 
ploded somewhere in the harbor an hour after, 
throwing up water in every direction. Though it 
did no harm, it frightened the rest of the men-of- 
war, and made them evacuate the harbor for a 
time. 

Abijah said on landing: 

"Just as I said, Gen'ral ! it all failed for want of 
229 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

that quid of tobacco. You see I am narvous with- 
out it. I got under the Eagle s bottom, but some- 
how the screw struck the iron bar, that passed from 
the rudder pintle, and wouldn't hold on, anyhow I 
could fix it. Just then I let go the oar to feel for a 
quid, to steady my nerves, and I hadn't any. The 
tide swept me under her counter, and away I slipped 
top o' water. I couldn't manage to get back, so I 
pulled the lock, and let the thunder-box slide. I 
say, can't you raise a quid among you now?" 

Abijah was too much of a hoodoo for The Ameri- 
can Turtle. She was not tried again. 

Among the British officers on Staten Island was 
Major James MoncreifTe, whom Putnam had known 
during the French war, and whom he had greeted 
so enthusiastically at Cambridge at the exchange 
of prisoners. Moncreiffe had a daughter Margaret, 
a beautiful, vivacious girl, fourteen years old. She 
was at this time in Elizabeth, New Jersey, but was 
very anxious to visit her father on Staten Island. 
To do this, she had to pass through the American 
lines. Major Moncreiffe wrote to Putnam, asking 
for a pass for her. He did not address him as 
"General," because, considering Putnam a rebel, he 

230 



AT NEW YORK 

thought he had no right to the title. Margaret was 
afraid this omission would make trouble, so she 
wrote to Putnam herself, begging that he overlook 
it. Putnam's reply was dictated by his own kind- 
ness, but written by his secretary, Aaron Burr, so 
it is better expressed than many of his notes. He 
said that the omission of his title did not bother 
him in the least, nor influence his conduct in the 
matter of giving the pass. "As an officer he [her 
father] is my enemy, and obliged to act as such, be 
his private sentiments what they will. As a man I 
owe him no enmity ; but, far from it, will with pleas- 
ure do any kind office in my power for him or any 
of his connections." He went on to say that he 
could probably obtain a pass for her later, though 
not at the present time, and, in the meantime, he 
invited her to visit his wife and two daughters, at 
his house. 

The Tory girl accepted, and this is what she 
thought of the household when she arrived. 

"When I arrived in Broadway (a street so 
called), where General Putnam resided, I was re- 
ceived with great tenderness by Mrs. Putnam and 
her daughters, and on the following day I was in- 

231 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

troduced by them to General and Mrs. Washington, 
who likewise made it their study to show me every 
mark of regard; but I seldom was allowed to be 
alone, although sometimes, indeed, I found an op- 
portunity to escape to the gsWevy, on the top of the 
house, where my chief delight was to view with a 
telescope our fleet and army on Staten Island. My 
amusements were few ; the good Mrs. Putnam em- 
ployed me and her daughters constantly to spin flax 
for shirts for the American soldiers, indolence in 
America being totally discouraged; and I likewise 
worked for General Putnam, who, though not an 
accomplished muscadin, like our dilettanti of St. 
James's Street, was certainly one of the best char- 
acters in the world; his heart being composed of 
those noble materials which equally command re- 
spect and admiration." 

At a dinner one day at which Washington was 
present, Margaret refused to join in a toast to the 
Continental Congress. This somewhat embarrassed 
the company, she says ; but "my good friend, Gen- 
eral Putnam, as usual, apologized, and assured them 
I did not mean to offend." They told her they 
would forgive her if, when she dined at General 

232 



AT NEW YORK 

Howe's, she would drink to the health of General 
Washington or General Putnam. 

A few days later, Margaret was allowed to go 
over to Staten Island, on a barge. She was at once 
invited to Howe's to dinner. She says she almost 
died of shyness at being obliged to encounter the 
gaze of some forty or fifty other guests at the din- 
ner; but she apparently soon recovered herself, for 
being asked, according to the prevailing military eti- 
quette, to propose a toast, she gave, "General Put- 
nam." A Colonel at her elbow said in a low voice, 
"You must not give him here." 

"Oh, by all means," said Sir William Howe, mis- 
chievously, "if he be the lady's sweetheart I can 
have no objection to drink his health." 

Margaret v/as more embarrassed than ever. She 
wished herself a thousand miles away. To divert 
the attention of the company from herself, she gave 
her host a note from Putnam which she had been 
commissioned to deliver. She was a little ashamed 
of the spelling of her Yankee friend, and we can't 
blame her. This was the note : 

"Gin'ral Putnam's compliments to Major Mon- 
crieffe, has made him a present of a fine daughter, 

233 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

if he don't lick [like] her he must send her back 
again, and he will previde her with a good tTvig 
[Whig] husband." 

Evidently Margaret's father did like her, for we 
don't hear of her going back to her rebel friends 
again, or of her getting a twig husband, either. 

Brooklyn Heights is across the East River from 
New York, and commands it very much as Dorches- 
ter Heights commands Boston. In August, the Brit- 
ish on Staten Island, who had now been reenforced 
by Clinton's and Cornwallis's armies, and numbered 
more than thirty-one thousand, were seen preparing 
to make an aggressive movement, and it was soon 
evident that they were going to cross to Long Island. 
Upon this, Washington reenforced the garrison on 
Brooklyn Heights, which was under the command 
of Greene, and as Greere v/as sick with a fever, he 
presently sent General Putnam over to take com- 
mand. 

Putnam had only been there two days when Gen- 
eral Howe with hl.^ army managed to get in his rear, 
surprise and overpower his picket on the Jamaica 
Road, and win what was called the Battle of Long 
Island in the rear of the Brooklyn works. Putnam 

234 



AT NEW YORK 

was not considered responsible for this defeat, as 
he had not had time to become acquainted with the 
ground, and had acted with Washington's assistance 
in posting his men. It was a sad defeat, however, 
for the American side, and would have been worse, 
if Howe had not remembered Bunker Hill and de- 
cided not to make a direct assault on Brooklyn 
Heights, but to besiege it instead. A few nights 
later, Washington, with masterly strategy, managed 
to bring all his men away from Long Island in 
boats without Howe's perceiving it. Putnam helped 
in this brilliant movement; and Washington left him 
in command of the city of New York, while he took 
a part of the forces above New York along the 
Harlem River toward White Plains. 

About two weeks after, on September 15, Putnam, 
who was preparing to evacuate New York, which 
could not long be held now that the British possessed 
Brooklyn Heights, heard the sound of cannon from 
the East River, at what was then Kip's Bay, now 
the foot of 314th Street. He galloped to the spot, 
meeting on the way Washington, who was riding 
from his headquarters on Harlem Heights in the 
same direction. The two leaders found that the men 

235 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

who had been posted to guard the East River bank 
were fleeing before the advance of the British, who 
had landed. 

Washington and Putnam did their best to rally 
the men, but finding this was impossible, Putnam 
dashed back to New York, to save his troops there, 
if possible, from being cut oflF by the British. He 
found they had already been started by Major Burr, 
and urged them on. It was a very hot day, and 
many of the men fainted. Putnam's horse was 
covered with foam; he was everywhere, encourag- 
ing the troops. They would certainly have been in- 
tercepted, however, if it had not been for Mrs. 
Lindley Murray, a Quaker lady favoring the Ameri- 
can side, who lived in a handsome house on the hill 
still called Murray Hill. She sent an invitation to 
General Howe and his officers to come and lunch 
with her. They accepted — and she detained them 
so long with her delightful hospitality, that, by the 
time luncheon was over, Putnam and his hot and 
tired men had safely reached Washington's army 
at Harlem Heights. 

In spite of this lucky escape, the Continental army 
was greatly depressed. They had surrendered their 

236 



AT NEW YORK 

position, and had been ignominiously chased by the 
British, who, in a skirmish soon after this on Clare- 
mont Heights, sounded the fox-hunting call on 
their bugles while they pursued the Americans as 
if they were foxes. They rallied at Morningside 
Heights and at White Plains, but, soon after, Fort 
Washington, which General Putnam and General 
Greene had considered safe, fell into the hands of 
the British, and Fort Lee, on the opposite side 
of the Hudson, had to be evacuated. 

The British now were in possession of Rhode Is- 
land, Long Island, the city of New York, Staten 
Island, and almost all of New Jersey. Washing- 
ton's army dwindled to three thousand ragged and 
starving men; whole brigades were deserting him 
at one time. Howe had offered a full pardon to all 
who would take the oath of allegiance, and many 
did so. Washington began his retreat. Pie was 
driven from Fort Lee to Newark, from Newark to 
New Brunswick, from New Brunswick to Prince- 
ton, from Princeton to Trenton, Cornwallis pursu- 
ing him with his army, often in plain sight. It 
was the darkest period of the American cause ; but 
no matter who desponded or deserted, Putnam never 

237 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

gave up courage. He supported Washington on the 
retreat, and was one of the last of the fugitive army 
to cross the Delaware at Trenton early in Decem- 
ber. 

From there Putnam was sent to take command 
at Philadelphia, where a British attack was expected. 
Congress was so frightened that it left the city and 
went to Baltimore. Putnam fell to work on de- 
fenses; but at Christmas time came the glorious 
news of the capture of Trenton, which greatly im- 
proved the situation. Putnam was now needed to 
help Washington in New Jersey, and he spent the 
rest of the winter at Princeton. While here he did 
not take part in any large movement, but did good 
service in harassing the British in their winter quar- 
ters at Brunswick, cutting off their supply trains, 
taking prisoners, etc. He took nearly one thousand 
prisoners and more than one hundred and twenty 
baggage wagons during the winter. There was no 
one who could surpass him at this sort of hand-to- 
hand work. Major Burr was again on his staff dur- 
ing this winter, and wrote, "I am at present quite 
happy in the esteem and entire confidence of my 
good old General." No one guessed then that such 

238 



AT NEW YORK 

a promising and brilliant young man as Burr would 
fall into disgrace in later life. 

The "good old General," as usual, was showing 
great kindness to his prisoners. When he came to 
Princeton, after the Battle of Princeton, he found a 
wounded Scotchman there, who had received little 
attention from the surgeon. Putnam at once got 
medical attendance for him and did everything in his 
power to make him comfortable. 

"Pray, sir, what countryman are you?" the 
wounded man is said to have asked Putnam. 

"An American." 

"Not a Yankee?" incredulously. 

"A full-blooded one," said Putnam, good-humor- 
edly. 

"I am sorry for that," answered the Scotchman. 
"I did not think there could be so much goodness 
and generosity in an American, or, indeed, in any- 
body but a Scotchman !" 

This same man. Captain McPherson, was very 
anxious to have a friend in the British army at 
Brunswick come to see him. Putnam hated to re- 
fuse, but he had a force of only a few hundred 
troops at that time, and did not wish to expose his 

239 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

weakness to the enemy. However, he thought of a 
plan by which he could avoid this, while letting the 
sick man see his friend. He sent a flag of truce to 
the British camp, with a request to let the visitor be 
escorted to the American camp after dark. That 
evening, he had lights put in all the rooms of the 
College buildings and in every window of every 
house in town. While the visitor was talking to 
his friend, Putnam's force continually marched past 
his window, sometimes in small detachments, some- 
times altogether. The visitor, when he returned to 
Brunswick, reported to the British commander that 
the American troops at Princeton numbered at least 
four or five thousand men ! 



XVIII 
IN TROUBLE AND OUT AGAIN 



XVIII 
IN TROUBLE AND OUT AGAIN 

IN May, 1778, Putnam was placed by Washing- 
ton in command of the Highlands of the Hud- 
son. He was supported by Brigadier-General 
Alexander McDougall, at Peekskill, to whom Gen- 
eral Washington wrote, when he told him that Put- 
nam was to have the chief command of that depart- 
ment: 

"You are well acquainted with the old gentle- 
man's temper; he is active, disinterested, and open 
to conviction, and I therefore hope, that, by afford- 
ing him the advice and assistance which your knowl- 
edge of the post enables you to do, you will be very 
happy in your command under him." 

Soon after Putnam took command, Edmund 
Palmer, a Tory spy, was captured inside the Ameri- 
can lines and condemned to be shot. Sir Henry 
Clinton, in charge of the British troops in New 
•York, thought he could frighten Putnam into letting 

243 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

him go. He sent up to claim Palmer, saying that 
the Amierican general had no right to have him 
executed, and threatening vengeance if the execution 
was carried out. 

Putnam sent back this reply : 

"Headquarters, 7 August, 1777. 

"Edmund Palmer, an officer in the enemy's serv- 
ice, was taken as a spy lurking within our lines ; he 
has been tried as a spy, condemned as a spy, and 
shall be executed as a spy, and the flag is ordered to 
depart immediately. "Israel Putnam. 

"P. S. — He has been accordingly executed." 

In the fall of 1777, Putnam was obliged to sur- 
render Peekskill and the other forts on the Hudson 
to Sir Henry Clinton, who moved up the river and 
succeeded in out-maneuvering him. This blow was 
counteracted by Burgoyne's surrender at Saratoga 
Springs, and Putnam with the troops was enabled 
to reoccupy the forts. During this time so full of 
disaster from a military point of view, Putnam suf- 
fered two personal bereavements ; first, the death of 
his stepson, a promising young man, of whom he 
was very fond, who died in his headquarters at 

244 



IN TROUBLE AND OUT AGAIN 

Peekskill, and then his wife, who died there just 
about the time of Burgoyne's surrender. 

Putnam was very anxious to attack New York, 
and planned to send down for that purpose some 
reeriforcements which were soon to arrive from the 
Northern Department, which were no longer needed 
there after Burgoyne's surrender. He was full of 
these plans one day of October, 1777, when a young 
man, not yet twenty, in a lieutenant-colonel's uni- 
form, rode up to his quarters, with a message from 
Washington. It was Washington's aide-de-camp, 
Alexander Hamilton. He had been sent to get reen- 
forcements for Washington's army in Pennsylvania, 
and told General Putnam that Washington wished 
the very troops he, Putnam, was planning to send 
to New York. 

After delivering this message in a curt, abrupt 
manner, rather galling to the older man, Hamilton 
mounted a fresh horse and went on to Albany. 

A week later he returned, and found that Put- 
nam, still full of his New York project, had not sent 
the required detachments. Hamilton was very 
angry. 

"I am astonished and alarmed beyond measure," 
245 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

he sent word to Putnam, "that all his Excellency's 
views have been hitherto frustrated, and that no 
single step of those I mentioned to you has been 
taken to afford him the help he absolutely stands in 
need of, and by delaying which, the cause of Amer- 
ica is put to the utmost conceivable hazard. . . . 
How the non-compliance can be answered to Gen- 
eral Washington, you can best determine. 

"I now, Sir, in the most explicit terms, by his 
Excellency's authority, give it as a positive order 
from him, that all the Continental troops under 
your command may be immediately marched to 
King's Ferry, there to cross the river, and hasten 
to reenforce the army under him. ..." 

These were strong words from a boy not yet 
twenty, with little military experience, to a General 
of Putnam's age, and Putnam felt that they con- 
tained "some most unjust and injurious reflections" 
upon himself, and sent the letter to Washing- 
ton with that remark. He could not get it out 
of his head that the troops were needed in New 
York. 

Washington replied, mildly but firmly, "I cannot 
but say, there has been more delay in the march 

246 



IN TROUBLE AND OUT AGAIN 

of the troops, than I think necessary; and I could 
wish that in future my orders may be complied with 
without arguing upon the propriety of them." 

Putnam realized he was in the wrong. The truth 
of it was, he was growing old, a trifle "sot in his 
ways," as his New England friends would have 
said; but he was not too old to learn a lesson, and 
he never repeated the mistake. 

Another trouble was in store for Putnam. The 
New York people did not like him. He had been 
too lenient to the deserted and suffering families 
of Tories, and had too readily granted passes in 
and out of the American lines. Politics also had 
something to do with his unpopularity. There was 
a good deal of jealousy between New York and 
New England, and Putnam was a dyed-in-the-wool 
New Englander. At any rate, the feeling, without 
any real fault, so far as we can tell, on Putnam's 
side, became so strong that Washington thought it 
best to remove him from the command of the High- 
lands. General McDougall was given the post. 
Meanwhile, in response to a demand from Congress, 
Washmgton arranged for a Court of Inquiry which 
should investigate the losses of the posts on the 

247 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

Hudson during the fall before, and Putnam's con- 
duct therein. 

The "good old General" showed his patriotism 
by taking these humiliations in good part. All he 
wished for was to serve his country, in whatever 
way was permitted him. He returned to Connecti- 
cut and was employed in recruiting. When he had 
finished this duty, and learned that Congress had 
not yet decided upon his case and his rank was still 
in doubt, he did indeed write a pathetic note to 
Washington. 

"I have waited with the utmost impatience for 
orders," he said, "but none having arrived ... I 
think there must be some mistake. ... I must beg 
that the Hon'ble Congress will take this matter into 
their consideration, and grant that I may be ac- 
quitted and that with Honor or tried by a Genl. 
Court Martial ... so that My Character Might 
stand in a clearer light to the world; but to be 
posted here as a public spectator for every ill 
Minded person to make their remarks upon, I think 
is very poor encouragement for any person to ven- 
ture their lives and fortunes in the Service." 

By the time this note reached Washington, the 
248 



IN TROUBLE AND OUT AGAIN 

investigating committee had reported to Congress 
that Putnam was not to blame for the loss of the 
forts, and Congress had accepted the decision and 
restored to him his old standing in the army. He 
served again on the Hudson for a short time, and 
was then sent to Connecticut to protect the country 
along the Sound from marauding parties which the 
British sent out from the neighborhood of New 
York. 

During the winter of 1778 some of the Connecti- 
cut troops mutinied because of the great hardships 
they suffered and the total stoppage of their pay. 
They assembled under arms, determined to march 
to Hartford and demand redress of the Assembly. 
Putnam heard of it, and instantly galloped to the 
spot. He made them the following speech, in his 
earnest, blunt way: 

"My brave lads, whither are you going? Do you 
intend to desert your officers, and to invite the enemy 
to follow you into the country? In whose cause 
have you been fighting and suffering so long? Is 
it not your own? Have you no property? no pa- 
rents? no wives? no children? You have thus 
far behaved like men — the world is full of your 

249 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

praises — and posterity will stand astonished at your 
deeds; but not if you spoil it all at last. Don't you 
consider how much the country is distressed by the 
war; and that your officers have not been any 
better paid than yourselves? But we all expect bet- 
ter times, and then the country will do us ample jus- 
tice. Let us all stand by one another, then, and 
fight it out like brave soldiers. Think what a shame 
it would be for Connecticut men to run away from 
their officers !" 

He then rode along the line, and the men who 
but a moment before had been ready to desert, pre- 
sented arms and saluted him in the usual way. That 
was the end of the mutiny. 

In February, 1779, General Putnam was at 
Horseneck, a part of Greenwich, Connecticut, with 
a small picket of about one hundred and fifty men, 
when he heard that the Tory, Governor Tryon of 
New York, was approaching with fifteen hundred 
men to surprise the American outpost and seize the 
salts works near Greenwich. Putnam determined 
to delay the British as much as possible, though he 
knew he had no chance of success against them. He 
stationed himself with his men on top of a hill in 

250 




Pi TNAMs Escape at Horse Neck 



IN TROUBLE AND OUT AGAIN 

Greenwich, and as the British came near, sent them 
several volleys from his two pieces of artillery, 
which did them some damage, but not much. The 
British dragoons prepared to charge. Putnam im- 
mediately ordered his men to seek refuge in a 
swamp near by, which was inaccessible to horses. 
He himself started to ride to Stamford and get 
reenforcements. The dragoons saw him and gave 
chase. For a quarter of a mile they pursued him, 
and then the road reached a point where it passed 
by a steep precipice. Down a part of this precipice 
were some rough stones, placed to form irregular 
steps from the plain below, by those who wished to 
make a short cut to the little Episcopal Church on 
the hill. The rest of the way was steep and rocky ; 
no one had ever dreamed of descending it except 
on foot. 

Putnam heard the ringing hoofs behind him. He 
did not hesitate a second, but spurred his horse and 
dashed over the edge of the precipice ! Some say he 
took tlie stone steps, others that he descended in 
zig-zags; but he gained in safety the plains below. 
The dragoons fired at him as he descended, and one 
of the bullets pierced his military cap. None dared 

251 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

follow. Putnam, at the bottom, waved his sword 
tauntingly in their direction, and rode on towards 
Stamford. 

A woman in a farmhouse along the way heard 
the beat of horse-hoofs and rushed to the door to 
call her four little children out of the way. She 
saw the hatless General, "his long hair blowing 
about his round, kindly face." He stopped for a 
moment on his way by, reining up his horse on his 
haunches. 

"Take your children in," he shouted. "The Brit- 
ish are upon us!" The next instant he was gone. 

When he returned to Horseneck with a reenforce- 
ment, he found the British had left. Governor 
Tryon, in recognition of Putnam's bravery on this 
occasion, and also of his kindness to prisoners, is 
said to have sent him a new suit of military clothes, 
with a hat to replace the one shot through by the 
British bullet. 

I think that Putnam on this occasion leaped 
straight into the hearts of American boys forever. 
It was a fitting climax to a gallant career; and it is 
almost the last thing I have to tell you of the old 
hero. 

252 



XIX 

A SUNNY OLD AGE 



XIX 

A SUNNY OLD AGE 

IN December of the same year, Putnam, who had 
been visiting at his home with Daniel, now a 
Major in the army, was beginning his journey 
on horseback back to the army's winter quarters in 
Morristown, New Jersey, when he felt a numbness 
in his right side, which rapidly grew worse. It was 
a paralytic stroke. He dismounted at the house 
of a friend, and after a while partially recovered 
and was able to return home ; but he soon found, to 
his great sorrow, that he could not resume his duties 
in the army. 

He lived eleven years longer, and was able to 
walk and ride horseback. His contemporaries draw 
a pleasant picture of the old gentleman, as sunny as 
ever in his old age, the pride of the countryside, rid- 
ing here and there to visit friends, or telling stories 
to visitors in his own home. 

Two of his favorite stories at this time were about 
255 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

duelling, a practice of which he strongly disap- 
proved. It seems that once, without intending it, 
Putnam had offended a brother officer, who chal- 
lenged him to a duel. Putnam did not refuse. 

At the appointed time, the officer went to the duel- 
ing ground, with a sword and pistols. As soon as 
he entered the field, Putnam, who was standing at 
the opposite end, about thirty rods away, leveled 
his musket and fired in his direction. 

The astonished officer ran towards him. Putnam 
deliberately reloaded his gun. 

"Stop!" cried the other. "What are you doing? 
Is this the conduct of an American officer, and a 
man of honor?" 

"What am I doing?" Putnam replied. "A pretty 
question to put to a man whom you intended to 
murder! I'm going to kill you; and if you don't 
beat a retreat in less time than it would take old 
Heath to hang a Tory, you're a gone dog!" As 
he said this, Putnam lifted his gun, all ready to 
fire. 

The ofificer turned and fled ! 

The other story was about an English officer, a 
prisoner on parole, who took offense at some re- 

256 




Putnam's Duel with the British Officer 



A SUNNY OLD AGE 

marks of General Putnam's about the British. He 
challenged him. Putnam accepted the challenge, on 
condition that he should select the weapons. The 
next morning, they met. The Englishman found 
Putnam sitting by the side of what seemed to be a 
barrel of gunpowder, smoking a pipe. There was 
an opening in the top of the barrel, and a match 
had been put in the opening. 

Putnam asked the Englishman to sit down on the 
other side of the cask ; then he set fire to the match 
with his pipe, remarked that there was an equal 
chance for each of them when the gunpowder should 
explode, and calmly went on smoking his pipe. 

The Englishman watched the match for a mo- 
ment, as the flame crept towards the powder. When 
it was a few inches away, he decided to go — and he 
went very quickly. 

"Ah," cried "Old Put," "you are just as brave 
a man as I took you to be. This is nothing but a 
barrel of onions, with a few grains of powder on 
the head, to try you by. But you don't like the 
smell." 

Putnam received two most appreciative letters 
from Washington after his retirement. One said: 

257 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

"Dear Sir — I am very happy to learn from your 
letter of the 29th handed me by Major Humphreys, 
that the present state of your health is so flattering, 
and that it promises you the prospect of being in a 
condition to make a visit to your old associates some 
time this campaign. I wish it were in my power 
to congratulate you on a complete recovery. I 
should feel a sincere satisfaction in such an event, 
and I hope for it heartily, with the rest of your 
friends in this quarter. 

"I am, dear Sir, &c., 

"G. Washington." 

The other contained the following sentences : 

"I can assure you that, among the many worthy 
and meritorious officers with whom I have had the 
happiness to be connected in service through the 
course of this war, and from whose cheerful assist- 
ance and advice I have received much support and 
confidence, in the various and trying vicissitudes of 
a complicated contest, the name of a Putnam is not 
forgotten ; nor will it be but with that stroke of time 
which shall obliterate from my mind the remem- 
brance of all those toils and fatigues, through which 

258 



A SUNNY OLD AGE 

we have struggled for the preservation and estab- 
lishment of the rights, Hberties, and independence 
of our country." 

Needless to say, Putnam cherished this letter with 
great pride. 

Putnam passed his last years on his old farm in 
Pomfret. Daniel was married and living on a farm 
nearby; and Peter Schuyler Putnam, once the baby 
of the family, now grown up and married, lived 
with the General. 

In 1790 Putnam died, after a few days' illness. 
He was buried in the Brooklyn graveyard, and over 
his tomb was placed a marble slab, with the follow- 
ing epitaph, written by his friend, Timothy Dwight, 
afterwards the president of Yale College : 

TO THE MEMORY 

OF 

ISRAEL PUTNAM, ESquifC, 

SENIOR MAJOR-GENERAL IN THE ARMIES 

OF 

THE UNITED STATES- OF AMERICA 

who 

was born at Salem, 

in the Province of Massachusetts, 

on the 7th day of January, 

A. D. 1718, 

259 



ISRAEL PUTNAM 

and died 
on the 19th day of May, 
A. D. 1790. 



Passenger, 

if thou art a Soldier, 

drop a tear over the dust of a Hero, 

who, 

ever attentive 

to the lives and happiness of his men, 

dared to lead 

where any dared to follow; 

if a Patriot, 

remember the distinguished and gallant services 

rendered thy country, 

by the Patriot who sleeps beneath this marble; 

if thou art honest, generous, and worthy, 

render a cheerful tribute of respect 

to a man, 

whose generosity was singular, 

whose honesty was proverbial ; 

who 

raised himself to universal esteem, 

and offices of eminent distinction, 

by personal worth, 

and a 

useful life. 

It is a true epitaph. Not alone in a military 
way did Israel Putnam distinguish himself. Dur- 
ing half a lifetime of rough days in camp, he kept 

260 



A SUNNY OLD AGE 

his personal honor clean and bright. He was a good 
husband, a good father, a good citizen. Through 
long years of bitter combat, he never went back on 
a friend, and never treated a prisoner taken in fair 
warfare as anything but a friend. There have been 
greater men than Israel Putnam in our country's 
history, men with bigger brains and cooler judg- 
ment, but there have been none more honest, brave 
and kind, none who have worked harder in the pub- 
lic service, none who have cared less about their own 
personal glory and reward. In the forest fighting 
about Crown Point, in the cold of Canada, beneath 
the burning sun of Cuba, on the waves of the Great 
Lakes, in his quiet home in Connecticut, and amid 
all the turmoil of the most troubled years of the 
Revolution, Israel Putnam threw himself, heart and 
soul, into his country's cause. He was an Ameri- 
can through and through; and he has earned his 
place in the ranks of our country's heroes for all 

time. 

(I) 



